I scan the crowd until the irritation passes, then glance at a clock and realize the half hour warm-up is over. All the band members are rounded up—the phrase is a perfect pun, given our surroundings—and seated at tables in the front of the VIP area. Lines have already formed, with people waiting to get pictures, autographs, and meet the musicians.
After taking a few out-of-focus shots of the crowd, I decide it’s time to get a drink and a plate of food.
The night drags as I sip Diet Coke and watch Kayla direct the madhouse. The crowd of girls in front of Luminescent Juliet’s table grows by the minute. The band might not be well-known, but the guys’ hotness creates a draw that soon enough makes their line longer than the others.
The guys sometimes take breaks and join me at the bar to bitch about how dumb the event is, but I’m mostly alone and horribly bored. I do meet several members of the other bands as they come up for breaks. Most of the guys in Brookfield seem reserved and almost businesslike compared to the guys in Griff, who dress and act like rockers.
Near the end of the event, I head for the back door to get away from the noise and to call Bryce from the parking lot. When I step outside, the smell of weed is unmistakable. Spotting Kayla and Sam amid a haze of smoke a few yards from the building, I nearly drop my phone as I step back, stunned by the sight of them together. I feel a burst of annoyance like the one from earlier. I immediately justify it as shock that they’re getting high in the middle of a promotional event.
Kayla giggles at my look of surprise.
Sam pinches off the joint’s red, burning cherry and stalks toward me. “Go inside,” he orders Kayla, stepping up to me and tossing the butt onto the cement.
Her bottom lip juts out in a pout, but she does what he asks.
Though I haven’t seen him smoke since the day we left, Sam digs out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket. “Don’t say anything to Romeo.”
He is not asking. He is telling me. I clench the phone in my fist. “So you’re assuming I’d go and tattle? I’m not like that, Sam.”
He taps a cigarette on the side of his wrist. “Peyton, I’m not trying to start an argument or be a dick. Romeo gets in my business too much, and I don’t want to deal with it. I didn’t expect you to run to him, just maybe to say something in passing.”
“I wouldn’t say anything.” Obviously, Sam must smoke pot somewhat regularly for him to be this adamant about Romeo not finding out about it. Still, I’m surprised. From what I recall, he never used to. He didn’t drink much when we’d hung out in the past either. Sam and I had usually been the most sober ones at high school parties. Fear of too many empty calories had always kept me from overindulging. I’d never been sure why he’d steered clear of partying. But it’s clear he doesn’t anymore. Really, though, his partying habits are none of my business.
“Thanks,” he says, lifting his lighter. A flame brightens his face as he lights his cigarette. His eyes are glazed and red.
I cock an eyebrow. “You don’t think Romeo’s going to notice?”
He blows out smoke, then laughs. “This tour has him wound tighter than a coke fiend. He doesn’t pay attention much anymore.”
The bass line of “Higher Ground” rings out of Sam’s pants.
He digs his phone from a pocket and sighs at the screen. “Yeah?” he answers in an irritated tone.
Even before he starts talking, the pained look on his face tells me his psycho girlfriend is on the other end of the line. Not wanting to eavesdrop again, I rush to the back door as he says, “Stop it. That shit isn’t true.”
Though I’m annoyed with him right now, a surge of protectiveness hits me. He needs to break up with this woman. Constant arguing isn’t a relationship. Been there. Done that. It sucks. As I step into the hallway, I wonder if this girl is the reason Sam drinks more now and smokes pot. Or why with other people he pretends to be the happy-go lucky-guy I used to know, when I can see that guy is mostly gone.
Chapter 8
It’s a bit odd waking up in a room with two men, especially knowing they stayed out late partying. I’m kind of wired to think of others—sometimes it turns into my downfall—so I try to be quiet when I wake up and sneak from my tiny rollaway into the bathroom. I’m certain Sam and Justin need their sleep. After we all came back from the radio station event, I called Bryce and went to bed, but Justin and Sam went to the hotel bar. I woke up briefly when I heard Justin come in around one. I woke up again when Sam stumbled into our room hours later. But now, as I tiptoe out of the bathroom, he is sitting up at the edge of his bed. He’s bent over his knees, with his hands covering his face.
“Sorry if I woke you,” I whisper. “I’m heading out to do laundry so you guys can sleep.”
Glancing at me through splayed fingers, he shrugs.
I grab my card key and quietly exit the room. At the bus, I give Gary a bag of bagels for meeting me and opening the bus, then drag our five half-full laundry bags to the laundry room, which is in the far recesses of the hotel. Given our limited clothes supply, I’m planning to take advantage of the washing machines at every hotel stop, even though we’re barely four days into the tour. Just as I finish dropping each bag in front of a machine, Sam waltzes in with two steaming cups.
As I stand there surprised, he holds out a hot coffee. “Thought you might like some company and some coffee.”
I practically snatch the drink from his hand. “Thanks,” I say, and take a long sip of the caffeinated goodness. Did he remember that I like it black? Or was he just guessing? Though I was planning to head to the exercise room for a half hour on the treadmill once the machines were going, Sam’s offer of company is too thoughtful for me to turn down. Besides, I’m only half awake.
After gulping down more coffee, I dig quarters out of my pocket and make a pile on the counter. “I was going to wash them all in cold. I planned on dumping them in without separating colors.” I wrinkle my nose. “I’m not touching dirty man underwear.”
Letting out a laugh, Sam sets his coffee down on a chair. “Sounds like a plan.”
We load the machines with clothes and quarters, then sit together sipping coffee in the line of plastic chairs. Water blasting into the machines fills the silence. I try to think of something neutral to talk about, something that doesn’t have to do with the past. Then I think, Screw that. Maybe it’s better to stop pretending there isn’t a past between us—well, except for that one night. That is so off-limits. But if we’re going to get along for real, pretending we weren’t friends just isn’t going to work anymore.
“So how is Seth doing?” I ask nonchalantly, and notice Sam’s grip around his cup tightens.
“He’s all right.”
“Is he at the University of Michigan?” Both Sam and Seth were supposed to go to school in Ann Arbor, which was why I’d dropped my purse freshman year when I saw Sam in the commons at our university. I’d never expected to run into him at college.
“No.”
“Where’d he go?”
“He went to the U of M for a semester and came home.”
“He isn’t going to college?”
“Nope.”
“Why?”
“Seth found out college isn’t for him.”
“But he was so excited when he got accepted.”
Sam shrugs.
His short or lame responses are starting to get on my nerves. “Is he working, then?”
He shifts, turning halfway toward me. “He cooks at a diner on Main Street. Why are you still interested in Seth?” he asks evenly.
I put my hand up, palm toward him. “Don’t. I’m not hung up on Seth. How could I be after the way he treated me? Almost everyone who lived within a hundred-mile radius of the party where we broke up thought I was a cheating skank or a whore slut. In the months before all that happened, he’d turned from the perfect boyfriend into a jealous, possessive nut. I should have broken up with him months before that night.”