Another Little Piece of My Heart Read online

But I’m too conflicted to say anything. Part of me wants to laugh because maybe now Jared will have more songwriting fodder, and I won’t make it onto his next album, after all. Maybe it’ll be Hannah.

  Another part of me wants to what—jump for joy?

  No. Definitely not. But I am relieved. The important thing here is that this lessens my chances of running into Jared again. Also, I must be over Jared because I don’t feel happy about Hannah’s change of heart.

  I don’t. I swear.

  Shit. I used to be better at lying to myself.

  Later, I corner Hannah in her bedroom as she gets dressed. “You, Mike, when? What about Jared?”

  As punishment for asking, Hannah points to the three outfits she has spread out on her bed. “Help me pick.” She grabs her brush and begins pulling up her hair. “I told you he started acting all weird on the trip? He never stopped. He was so—I don’t know—distant when he came by afterward. Mike was the one doing all the talking. And then he ditched me on Saturday, so...”

  “He gave me a ride home so I wouldn’t drive.”

  “I know, and it was very sweet of him to do that for you since you guys don’t seem to get along. But it left me and Mike together again, and well...” She breaks into a sly smile. “Mike’s a really good kisser. And we have so much more in common than Jared and I do.”

  I hold up the outfit with the least amount of pink. “That one. What do you guys have in common?”

  “Just stuff.” Hannah ties off her ponytail. “Jared talked about music all the time, and it was cool at first, but I don’t know anything about it. Honestly, you and him have so much more in common. Mike and I can talk about stuff like college.”

  I nod. “Makes sense.”

  Come eleven o’clock, I’m left all alone in the house. My guitar, my songs—I suppose I could play a bit. Work on those new ideas I had. The thought pokes me in the brain a few times, but what’s the point? My band is gone. I’m never going to perform again. Why torture myself? I’d be better off trying to find a way to sell my guitars and amps.

  Yet that thought in particular makes my breakfast threaten a return visit. Some stupid part of me wants to hold on. To believe.

  An hour later I pack Jayna into my car and drive to the nearby park. In better weather, and without the guitar, I’d have walked, but I don’t want to risk getting Jayna wet if the skies open up.

  The park is deserted. There aren’t even many trees to keep me company. The slide stands empty, and the swings dangle in the breeze, forlorn. I sit on the grass, on a hill that overlooks the ocean, Jayna on my knee. The same tune that’s been in my head for weeks now continues to drive me nuts—a melancholy rhythm with mournful lyrics, written in a minor key. A jumble of unfinished phrases and notes that hover in the air like ghosts waiting to be released from this musical purgatory I’ve created.

  I play the wannabe song over and over again, as if hoping by some miracle that the next time, instead of faltering, something brilliant will flow from my lips to complete the tune. And if not now, then the next time. Or the next. I’m waiting.

  I feel forsaken

  And my heart is breaking

  Little by little new snippets do spring to mind. I try them all out and write them down in a notebook, and wonder why I care. I will not be performing this song for anyone. It doesn’t have to be any good. But the progress lulls me into a sense of calm. I’m convinced this is the song about me and my family—the one I feel some weird need to write.

  Is it to help me work through my issues with them? It only seems to be causing more stress.

  Or is it to convince myself I can write something other than a Jared-sucks tune? So far my attempt is not convincing me of anything except that I suck.

  I adjust the guitar on my lap, and my mom’s bracelet slides down my arm. A spark of anger flares inside me, but it’s not directed at Jared for a change. I’m starting to realize that part of my anger isn’t about him at all. It’s anger at my parents for invading my head the way they did, and anger at myself for letting them in. But I can’t be angry at them anymore. Not really. My mom is dead.

  Jared, however, is alive, and that makes him a convenient target. He could have stopped me from screwing up. He could have responded to my messages and accepted my apologies. Instead, he ran and kept running until it made him famous, leaving me with echoes of my parents’ best intentions to play on repeat.

  “We want what’s best for you.”

  “You’re worrying your mother.”

  “He has no ambition.”

  “Look at his family.”

  “You’re too serious, too young.”

  “My daughter can do better.”

  Do the best of intentions matter when the end result feels so wrong?

  I write down more lyrics, struggling to find the heart of the tune.

  I’m here for a while. Cars pull up, their tires crunching over the sandy asphalt. Children run around, bringing the slide and swings to life with squealing laughter. Dogs are walked. The owners of the dogs and children leave. New people arrive. I stay where I am, a rock, tuned in to only my thoughts and the music.

  Finally, a voice knocks me from my daze and I cut off midphrase. “Hey.”

  I tense from my forehead to my toes as Jared sits down.

  “New song?”

  “Considering how lousy it is, I’d be too embarrassed to admit it if it was an old favorite.”

  “It’s not lousy.”

  I summon the courage to look at him. I don’t know why it’s so hard. He appears the same as always. Which is to say distractingly good, and another little piece of my heart breaks off.

  “Yeah, it is. This stupid tune’s been stuck in my head for a while, just the same couple phrases over and over. And I can’t figure out how to expand on them, and it’s bugging me.”

  Why am I telling him this? Sure, he can relate, but I don’t need to give him another reason to laugh at me.

  He starts to respond, but I cut him off. “What are you doing here?” If he wanted to go for a walk, there must be places that are nicer and closer to where he’s staying.

  Jared plucks at the grass. “I stopped by your house, but your father said no one was around.”

  His face tightens briefly, then the emotion passes. I can only guess what it was. Heat creeps up my neck.

  “Yeah,” I say, purposely knocking Jayna out of tune so I have to retune her and keep my hands busy. “You missed Hannah. She’s out with Mike.”

  “Oh, right. Hannah.” He ties the grass blades into knots. “Yeah, I know. She’s out on Mike’s boat. How’s she doing? I haven’t stopped by for a couple days.”

  “The broken ankle continues to interfere with her quest for the perfect tan, but otherwise she’s fine. I’ve never heard of anyone dying from tan lines before. But if you want to be her favorite again, you’d better give her some more chocolates.”

  Jared leans back on the grass. “If I need candy to win her over, it’s probably better to concede defeat.”

  “You’re really going downhill. Being dumped for a non-famous engineering major these days? I hear at your peak it took a car.”

  Jared says nothing. I hunch over Jayna, cringing at my own big mouth. “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be. It was kind of funny in an evil ex-girlfriend way. And I’m sure your cousin is really nice, but...”

  I take a deep breath. “But what?”

  “But she’s ditzy. I don’t think she’s actually dumb, but it’s like she refuses to think.” His voice is sharp, and he sits up. “What was she doing skipping down the path when it was so slick? Christ, Mike and I almost fell several times carrying her down the mountain. We all could have ended up with broken ankles or worse, and then what?”

  “Yeah, well, she was showing off, wasn’t
she? Everyone wants to impress the famous Jared Steele.”

  “Yeah, I get it.” Jared throws the grass at me. “Why do you think I was angry at myself? I screwed up. You have no idea how annoying it is to have people act that way around you, like they need to impress you all the time. If their brains don’t shut down, then they’re so busy trying to show off that you can’t believe anything they say. And Hannah was no different from any of the others, and I encouraged her so it’s my fault. That’s why I was over at your house every day at first. I felt guilty.”

  Well, crap. It’s harder to rub his face in it if he’s already had the epiphany. This is the Jared I remember. This is the Jared I liked.

  But I don’t want to like him anymore. Why is that easier said than done?

  “I’m happy for Mike. He liked her right away, and I should have kept out of his way. I only started flirting with her because...” Jared sighs. “I shouldn’t have done that to him. Not when he’s been so good about keeping quiet about us.”

  I swallow. “So he does know. I thought he must.”

  “He asked after the party, and lying seemed pointless since I really do think you two met before.”

  I scour my memory, but it’s hopeless. “I met a bunch of people from your school at various parties. I don’t remember most of them.”

  Jared attacks another clump of grass. “Yeah, so it seems. Neither does he. Anyway, Mike thinks I’m not being fair to Hannah, hiding something like that, and he’s right. But he promised not to say anything. Although that’s probably for your sake, not mine.”

  “Guess I should thank him then. This whole situation’s been strange enough without everyone asking questions.”

  “Yeah, strange is an understatement. The only thing that kept me from running out the door when I saw you in the grocery store was shock.”

  “You, too?”

  I wait for Jared to say more but he’s staring at the sky, at the seagulls congregating in a giant flock. All at once they swoop low and rest on the rocks across the way.

  I don’t know what else to say, either, so I start fiddling around with the song again. For a moment, I lose awareness of the awkwardness between us. There’s something so peacefully familiar about sitting next to him while strumming.

  I sneak glances at him while I play. His expression is contemplative, and the breeze blows stray strands of his sun-kissed hair into his face. I want to push the strands aside. I want to smooth down that stupid eyebrow hair of his. I want to press my cheek against his, feel how warm it is, turn my head so that our lips brush just one more time, and he’ll put his hand on my hip and pull me closer....

  I want a lobotomy so that I can get these dangerous cravings out of my head. It’s over, gone, never will be again. And I’d been fine with that until three weeks ago. Fine.

  Maybe this song is about him, after all. Damn it.

  I sing. Jared picks up my notebook and examines what I’ve written.

  This is my world

  This is my pain

  This is my tears

  This is me forsaken

  “When did you get the new guitar?” he asks.

  My fingers stiffen on the frets. “Christmas.”

  “You dad actually bought you one? I thought that sort of thing was against his religion.”

  “Funny. No, he didn’t buy it. I did with my gift money.”

  “Ah.” Jared bites his lip. “Can I?”

  It’s an old habit. I hand Jayna over to him without thinking and immediately regret it. I feel exposed without its weight on top of me, and I pull my knees in.

  “It has great tone.” He plucks each string individually and strums a few chords.

  I rest my chin on my knees. “Yeah, she’s—it’s—great. Know anyone in the market for one?”

  “You’re looking to sell it?” He raises an eyebrow. “Why?”

  “In case you haven’t realized, I’m not exactly working at the grocery store for my health.”

  Jared stops playing. “I figured you were working there so you had extra spending money for college. Didn’t feel it was my place to ask.”

  “I’m not going to college.” I can taste the bitterness in my voice. “It was too late to apply for financial aid when my dad lost his job. So college is out. For the moment anyway.”

  I hold out my hand because now I’m trembling and need to keep my fingers occupied.

  Jared passes me Jayna. “Sorry. Hannah clued me in about your dad. What do you plan to do?”

  “Don’t know.” I throw him a sarcastic smile, or as close as I can get to one. “Run off to New York and get noticed by someone famous? How’s that been working for you?”

  He laughs ruefully and spins the thumb ring around. “Yeah, great. Until suddenly there’s all this pressure that I need to have a second album, and it needs to be now before I lose momentum from the first, and it better not suck or that’ll be just as big a career-killer. And there’s all these other obligations that have nothing to actually do with music that I never thought about before, and it’s all zapping my will to get out of bed in the morning. Never mind write something that doesn’t suck.” He flops back to the grass.

  “Gee, didn’t you tell everyone you work best under pressure?”

  Jared gives me a wry look. “Everything I’ve written is crap. It’s so bad, Claire. So bad. I thought going somewhere new would take the pressure off, but that was stupid. It doesn’t change anything. My manager still calls me every day with something else I’m supposed to worry about. I can’t just disappear anymore. I can’t just write or play for me.”

  A snarky comment dances on the tip of my tongue. I want to suggest that he could exploit my problems again, or write a few songs about Hannah, but I don’t feel like wounding him. I try to conjure up the satisfaction—the schadenfreude—I felt a couple weeks ago when I realized he was struggling, but it’s missing.

  Jared’s eyes are closed, and his hands rest above his head. My body awakens with the urge to put my guitar aside and crawl over to him. Kiss his lips. Tell him it will be okay. I can picture myself doing it. Only in my head it all works out great because I forgive him, and he forgives me, and we really were meant to be together.

  “Sorry,” I mutter at last, as I emerge from the fairy tale in my head. “What about some of your older stuff? You have a bunch of songs that didn’t make it on the first album. What about that ‘daisy chain’ one? I can’t remember how it goes, but I liked it.”

  Jared snorts. “You were the only one who liked that song. Made me wonder about your taste.”

  I stick out my tongue at him. “Fine. If you’re going to go there, I admit the opening riff did go on kinda long...”

  A drop of water lands on my hand. Quickly, I stuff Jayna into her case as the drops increase in frequency.

  Jared peels himself off the grass and heads back to his truck along with me.

  “Hannah and Mike might be back,” I tell him. “And Lisa’s worried that you’re upset about them getting together. You coming over? You could put her mind at ease.”

  The rain’s become a fine drizzle. It turns Jared’s skin shiny as he laughs. “Yeah, but I might insult Hannah if they find out I’m not upset. There was never really anything between us, you know.”

  “You asked her out.” She was ready to sleep with you, I think. But Jared doesn’t need to know that.

  “I am aware of that.”

  I shrug and open the driver’s side car door. “Thanks for returning this the other day.”

  “No problem.” Jared opens his truck door and hesitates. “If you have a minute, would you mind... Would you give me an opinion on a couple songs? I trust you’ll tell me if you think something sucks.”

  I’m so shocked I bang my shin getting into the car. “Yeah, sure.”

&nb
sp; I half expect Jared won’t actually stop by the house, but he follows me out of the lot. In the two minutes it takes to drive home, I pick over every word he said about Hannah. I ponder every reason why he could want my opinion on his songs.

  Probably he figures I’ll be his toughest critic.

  I can tell from the cars that my aunt, April and Hannah are back. Jared parks along the curb and walks with me to the door. I don’t look at him. He doesn’t say anything. By some mutual agreement we’ve become strangers again even though he’s here because of me. It’s all so weird I don’t know what to think.

  April, Hannah, and Mike are in the kitchen, drinking coffee and eating fudge. They stare at me and Jared when we walk in. All of them, I’m assuming, for different reasons.

  “Buy anything?” I ask April. I get out a mug for coffee and offer one to Jared, who shakes his head.

  April eyes Jared warily. “Everything was ugly. But my shoes for the gala arrived today, so I got something nice in the mail.”

  “Gala?”

  “Yeah. You know the big fundraiser thing the Michelsons do? We’re going down tomorrow.”

  I freeze, caught halfway to the dining room, breathing in the steam from my coffee. The Michelsons’ annual gala—I knew it was coming up, but I hadn’t realized it was happening before we left New Hampshire.

  “That’s tomorrow? No one told me the date. Dad’s not expecting me to go, is he?”

  April guffaws. “You’re joking. The invitation came right before we left home. Hell, yeah, you’re going. I’m not being stuck there without you. I picked out your shoes, remember?”

  “But Dad never told me when it was. I have to work tomorrow and Friday.”

  Hannah, Mike and Jared are pretending not to watch us. I set down the coffee mug and stalk off to find my father. No surprise, he’s out on the back porch with Nikki. A wet breeze blows in through the screened-in windows.

  “You don’t expect me to go to the Michelsons’ party, do you?”

  My father’s reading the Wall Street Journal online. He doesn’t glance up from the screen. “Of course, you’re going. Families always attend. In fact, it would be nice if you’d dye your hair back to its natural color before Friday.” He turns to Nikki. “See if you can get her an emergency appointment at a salon tomorrow?”