Gone was the fire. Gone was the passion. In its place was the ice.
A coldhearted Keelani had taken possession of the love of my life. Numb. Frozen. Maybe full of fear. I didn’t fucking know.
That car wreck changed us, and I couldn’t seem to get her back, not even after hanging out with her every day at home, asking her what was wrong aside from the obvious, and visiting her family.
I knocked on her door a week later when I saw the large, black SUV outside her house. It was in my bones to keep tabs on her and her fucking reckless behavior. She went off the rails a lot when the label came to visit, and I knew today wouldn’t be any different.
But when I saw suitcases being wheeled out, my walk turned to a run.
I pushed past her sleazy-ass manager and strode straight into her house. Her mother was at the kitchen table, humming a quiet song about a beach in Hawaii where she’d grown up. I knew it to be a favorite of Kee’s because they would sing it together every now and then. Her and Kee’s voices were so similar that I’d come to find comfort in being in that kitchen, hearing the joy they spread through a melody.
Today, though, the melody was sad as she wiped away tears. Yet, she smiled at me when she saw me. “Dex, come in! Did Dimitri tell you?”
Anela had never known about Keelani’s relationship with me. She thought I came over to entertain her daughter when Dimitri wasn’t around, to check in, to be a good brother and neighbor.
“No. What’s going on? Dimitri has been acting weird.”
Her mother tried to get up, but she didn’t move as easily as she once had since the stroke. I waved away her effort and bent down to hug her.
“I know she’s near eighteen and she’s going to go off to college anyway, but I’m selfish, you know? I want my baby home.”
“Of course you do.” My heart thudded in my chest with confusion and fear now.
“You think Dimitri will go visit her? Keep her safe?” Her dark eyes were the exact same color as Kee’s and just as full of life most of the time. Why did they look so damn dejected now?
“Safe from what?” I ground out. Dimitri didn’t have to keep my girl safe from anything. That was my job. “Where’s Kee now?”
“Her bedroom.” She stood up to escort me back, but I loved that woman about as much as I loved my own mother.
“Sit down, Anela. Can I get you some water or something?”
“Of course not, honey.” She chuckled and sat down at her kitchen table. Grabbing her phone, she pulled her glasses from her shirt and pointed to her screen. “I’m going to just do some internet warrioring for a bit. Tell these trolls to leave my Keelani alone.”
“Mrs. Hale, can you not go on Instagram today?” Keelani’s bald headed manager whined from behind me, having entered the room with Keelani’s father.
Anela winked at me and tilted her head toward Keelani’s room before she started bickering with Mitchell. “Why shouldn’t I go online today? Everyone has something to say about her. Well, so do I. I am her mother after all.”
I took the opportunity to beeline down the hall of pictures that showcased Keelani smiling on stage, waving to crowds, dancing in skintight leotards. She was beautiful when she performed, but it was nothing compared to her standing in sweats at home without makeup.
Keelani’s big doe eyes looked up from another suitcase she was packing, and she didn’t race up to me like she normally did, didn’t hug me like I was everything to her now. Her movements were stilted as she took a shirt, folded it deftly, then placed it in the suitcase.
“Kee?” I murmured, not sure what the hell was happening.
She breathed out a long sigh before glancing out the window and then back down at the suitcase. Suddenly that long dark hair that I loved served as a shield to block me out, hiding her features from me. Then she said the words that would gnaw at my soul for years to come. “I’m leaving.”
“What?” I frowned, not sure I’d heard her correctly. “Wait. Now? Leaving for where? You don’t have a tour for—”
“No.” She shook her head and folded another shirt. “I’m leaving for good. Moving to Nashville.”
“Nashville?” I glanced around her room like there might be some clue I’d missed. “But you have college here starting in the summer—”
“I’m finishing last semester of senior year online, Dex, and then I’m not going to college. Trinity wants me in Nashville right now before the tour and—”
“You’re screwing with me,” I cut her off, shaking my head. My mind couldn’t comprehend what she was saying. She was the damn love of my life. Nashville was too far.
“I’m not.” Her tone was clipped and stiff but that was her only indication of pain.
I stared at the girl I loved, willed her to look at me. “You’re not leaving.”
She finally looked up and those deep-brown eyes of hers filled with tears. “How can you honestly think there would be any way for me to stay, Dex?”
“What’s stopping you?”
“The news! You… You shouldn’t have saved me, Dex.” Her voice was broken and full of pain as she said it.
“I’ll always save you, Kee. Don’t you get that?”
“But it’s ruined us instead of saving us! I have to leave now.” She threw up her hands.
“You don’t. You can’t. Gabriella’s still in the hospital. Dimitri’s all jittery as hell about getting in a car. You can’t leave now. You’re going to college here in the fall and—”
And me. You’ve got me here, I wanted to say.
“They’re writing about us,” she whispered, like I should care.
“So what?” I threw out the words harshly. It was the last thing on my mind. We were coping with trauma, trying to mend our bodies and minds. None of us should have had to worry about the public right now.
She spun around to grab her phone and then held it out to me, pointing her finger at the screen. “They’re writing about us together.”
Her and her fucking secrets. “Let me get this right. You’re leaving because the secret’s out about us. Who the fuck cares?”
She shut her eyes like she was in pain, and it crushed my damn soul. Her pain was because we were out there in the world, not because she was leaving, not because we were imploding in slow motion. And even still, I wanted to hug her, to tell her it would be all right. I didn’t step forward though. Not when she was breaking my heart.
She was trying to leave when all she had to do was stay. “I can’t be with you, Dex.”
“Fine. Don’t be with me.” I shrugged, acting as though the words didn’t feel like a knife to my gut. Then, trying to temper my reaction, I rubbed a hand over my face before I continued. “But you can’t leave. You’re Dimitri’s best friend. Your family needs you, and I…” I needed her too.
Didn’t she know that by now?
“My family needs me to leave. I’m a mess here. I’m wild and reckless, and it’s bad for my career and the record label and—”
“You’re you here,” I corrected her. “You go be fucking Goldilocks for a damn record label, then you’re selling yourself short. They’re watering you down. You should be singing the songs you sing in your bed to me. We go down to the lilacs in the woods, and you sing your heart out, Kee. That song you sing with your mom in the kitchen, the world wants that. That’s what you deserve, and what your family—”
“My family,” she emphasized and suddenly straightened, “wants me to go just like I want to go.”
“What the fuck did that record label tell you?” Something was wrong.
“They told me I can make it. My dreams can come true. And that Ethan really does love me, Dex. And I…” She hesitated and looked out the window, her chin trembling as she said the next words. “I think I love him too.”
That was the wrecking ball of destruction. Those words obliterated the confidence I had in our relationship, the confidence I needed to keep her here. “You don’t mean that,” I said and walked right up to her to take her chin in my hands, to rub over it back and forth. “Don’t lie to me, Kee. Not about that.”
She lifted her chin and backed away out of my reach. Her eyes shut, and I immediately missed the dark chocolate color of them. “Why are you making this hard? This wasn’t supposed to last, Dex. You know that.”
“Of course it was,” I whispered to her. “We were always going to last. You sang to me that you’d love me forever.”
“I do!” she screamed and threw up her hands, but then she fisted them and brought them back to her chest. “I did. But Ethan and I work together and…maybe I don’t love him now, but I could.”
She uttered that part in desperation, like she was trying to make me comprehend.
I shook my head. “I don’t understand, Kee.”
“I could love him, Dex. I will. I can do anything I set my mind to. You told me that once, and I believe it.”
“Don’t play with me,” I ground out. She was twisting my confidence in her, twisting my love. My emotions spun round and round, out of control. Sadness mixed with rage that burned so hot all I saw was red, vivid red that made me want to commit a damn crime against a man I didn’t know.
“Just… You honestly shouldn’t be here. I’m surprised my manager even let you through.”
“Let me through?” I muttered through gritted teeth, rage pumping in my stomach, in my bones, through my blood. “No one is going to let me do shit when it comes to you. You’re my girlfriend.”
“Ex-girlfriend,” she murmured.
“What?” I stepped back like she’d pummeled me.
“We can’t keep doing this. It’s not good for either of us. It’s never going to work with me moving and…” Her voice broke, but she managed to get out, “You can’t just be with me in secret for years. They have me under contract for three, and what if I re-sign with them? They’ll want me with someone…”
“Someone who will propel your career? Someone like Ethan Phillipe?” I wrestled the words out now, knowing where this was going.
“It’s not only about him, Dex. Do you honestly think it’s healthy for you to see me flirting with him out there and then coming back to apologize to you in private?”
“Then tell the label about us.” I said the words slowly because I’d never said them before.
She hissed, “What?”
“Tell them about us,” I repeated.
“I… I can’t, Dex.” She shook her head, and her beautiful hair swung back and forth.
“So you’re choosing him? That why you wanted me to keep this secret so badly for so long? In the end you wanted him and the fame and the money.” I shouldn’t have said it, but hurt people hurt people and all that shit.
“Screw you.” She shoved me, but I saw the quiver in her lip now. “You know that’s not what this is.”
“What is it then?”
“I just… I don’t love what the record label is doing either, but I signed.” Tears welled in her eyes. Then she whispered again, “I signed. I had to.”
“Right.” I took a step away from her. “You need to stand up for yourself with them for once, Kee. You practically run around this town, free as a bird, causing havoc wherever you go, and you won’t take shit from anyone. Why keep taking it from them?”
Crossing her arms over her chest, she put up a barrier between us physically and emotionally. “What if I want to take their shit, Dex? What if it’s what allows me to get my music out into the world?”
My jaw flexed involuntarily. It was her dream. My dream for her too. Everyone deserved to hear this girl sing, even if I wanted to bottle up her voice and keep it all to myself. “You should be doing it on your terms.” They’d already had her for a year and hadn’t let her sing a damn thing she wanted.
“These are my terms. This is what I want, Dex. They gave me options.” She took a deep breath and looked away. “This was the best one.”
“Leaving all of us is your best option?” I blurted out because I wanted her to repeat it. “Say it out loud, nice and slow, and tell me if it sounds right.”
“I’m leaving,” she whispered. “I’m leaving you all to follow my dream, and I hope you’ll support that.”
I shook my head back and forth. “You leave this town, I’ll never forgive you. You get that?”
“Dex, this isn’t how I want it to end. We could be friends and—”
“I’ll never be your friend.” The words came out fast with fury. “I’ve told you I love you; I’ve promised myself to you. I want to marry you…not be your friend.” She gasped at my confession, yet I continued on. “You’ve always been my girl, my girlfriend, my future wife. Nothing less. Don’t you get that? I promised you forever, Kee.”
“But forever can never be, Dex.” She choked back a sob, but this time I didn’t pull her to my chest like I had so many times before. She tried to cover her mouth with the back of her hand to hide her turmoil.
“Yeah. You pack that bag and leave, you can bet it’ll never be.”
She narrowed her eyes then, glared through her tears, and said, “Maybe one day you’ll overlook this, and we’ll be friends.”
“Never happening, Keelani. Never in a million years.”
My girl was stubborn.
She still packed up that night and left me.
