‘No, no. Stay. I want to go to your side.’

She slides off the stool and rounds the long table to make her way to me. There’s a spring in her step that I don’t think I’ve seen at all since the day we ran into each other in Terminal B.

She eagerly climbs onto the stool next to mine and leans over to whisper in my ear. ‘Don’t look now, but that old guy next to you thinks I’m crazy. He kept shooting me nasty looks and I was getting tired of looking at his sausage face.’

I turn my face to her so I can kiss her. Otherwise, I might clock the guy on my other side. Mikki’s lips are soft and they still taste a little like the fruit plate she had for a light lunch at the hotel. When I pull away from her, she’s clutching the front of my hoodie and staring into my eyes.

‘You . . . you’re going to give me a short circuit.’

I smile at the compliment and kiss her nose. ‘Drink your beer.’

Chapter 31: MIKKI – January 5th

The food and beer Crush ordered for me at Toro was better than any of the food we’ve had at the hotel, but I won’t admit to this. Not even after I’ve had another two beers and one Mamacita: a cocktail that tastes like a margarita mixed with beer. I have a pretty high tolerance for alcohol, but I think these IPAs Crush ordered for us must have more alcohol than tap beer; or maybe it’s the fact that I’ve hardly had anything to drink since we went to Wally’s two days ago. Or it could be that these tiny plates of food are not doing enough to slow the absorption of alcohol into my bloodstream. Whatever it is, I’m feeling pretty tipsy after two hours and four drinks at Toro.

Crush pays the check then I clumsily slide off the stool to leave. He lays his hand on my shoulder as I squeeze between the tables and bodies to make my way toward the entrance. Then I see it; a blue Red Sox cap.

Never forget that, in an instant, your entire world can go black.

*****

This mattress is too firm. This isn’t my bed.

I open my eyes and the first thing I see is black clouds. Then I see Crush and he’s smiling.

‘Are you okay?’ he says with a nod.

He wants me to say I’m okay.

I nod back.

He turns away and all the sounds come in: the crackling static of a radio; the muffled whoosh of cars driving by through the snow; the whispers. All of it is intelligible white noise, but it tells me the story of what just happened.

I must be lying on a gurney in front of Toro.

‘Did I pass out?’ I whisper, my throat feeling a bit raw.

No one hears me, but I can hear Crush now. ‘She doesn’t need to go to the hospital. She had one too many beers. Look, she’s fine now.’

I try to sit up, but my torso is strapped to the gurney. ‘Get this off of me!’

Crush immediately reaches for the straps holding me down. I attempt to focus on my breathing to block out the thoughts of my time in High Point. The medic in the uniform blue parka attempts to push Crush’s hands away and Crush shoves him back so he can finish releasing me. I sit up quickly and lock my arms around his shoulders as he lifts me off the gurney.

‘It’s okay. They’re not taking you anywhere,’ he whispers in my ear. ‘I won’t let them take you.’

‘We need to take her vitals one more time. It’s policy,’ the guy in the parka says from somewhere behind me.

‘Make it quick,’ Crush replies, relaxing his grip on me.

Reluctantly, I loosen my hold on him and he grabs my face to kiss my forehead. I sit on the gurney as the medic presses his stethoscope to my chest and I flinch.

‘Just check her wrist,’ Crush says. ‘She has a sunburn on her chest.’

Tears spill from the corners of my eyes as I’m overcome with an overwhelming sadness for everything he’s doing to keep me from going to the hospital. Love shouldn’t be this much work. He shouldn’t have to lie for me. He shouldn’t have to worry if I’m going to slit my wrists every time I go to the bathroom.

‘I don’t deserve you,’ I whisper and he looks me in the eye without saying anything.

‘Pulse is still a little weak, but it’s stronger than it was ten minutes ago. Next time, don’t drink so much,’ the medic says, moving out of the way so I can stand.

‘I won’t.’

Crush holds out his hand to help me up from the gurney and he pulls me aside so we’re a few yards away from the small crowd now making their way back inside Toro. I stare at the silver zipper of his hoodie to keep from looking into his eyes. I don’t want to know that he agrees with me that I don’t deserve him.

His fingertips are gentle on my skin as he lifts my chin. ‘Are you ready to hear your song?’

‘Yes.’

The drive to Wally’s in the backseat of the town car is short. Is this what life is like for rich people? You need something, you just call someone and they make it happen. Need a plane? Charter one. Need a ride to a club and don’t want your crazy girlfriend to be recognized . . . Look at that, already referring to myself as Crush’s girlfriend. I have definitely blown a fuse.

‘Do you want to talk about what happened back there?’ he says, giving my hand a soft squeeze.

‘Just the usual stuff that keeps me locked in my house. It was . . . the guy in the Red Sox cap.’

‘He was in there?’ he roars, sitting bolt upright.

‘No,’ I reply quickly, grabbing his arm to settle him back into the seat. ‘It wasn’t him; it was just a guy wearing a Red Sox cap.’

He looks at me with such heartbreak in his eyes. ‘You react that way whenever you see a Red Sox cap?’

‘Sometimes . . . if I’m caught off-guard.’

‘God. I’m so fucking sorry for what they did to you. I’m sorry I wasn’t there to stop it before it happened.’

I laugh at this response. ‘You don’t need to apologize. You didn’t even know I existed until you saw me in that parking lot.’

The car pulls up outside Wally’s, but the driver makes no mention of it. He allows us to continue talking and, again, I’m struck by how it’s the little things like being allowed to talk instead of being shoved out of a cab that rich people probably take for granted.

‘I did know you existed, remember?’ He lightly presses his fingertip over my sweater where my bunny tattoo lies beneath. ‘I was on Twitter that night because it was two weeks since Jordan died and I was meeting with a ballistics expert the following day who was supposed to record video of me loading a shotgun. The video was going to be used as evidence to show that I didn’t know what I was doing the night Jordan died . . . I got on Twitter that night hoping to confess that I did know what I was doing. Or, at least, I thought I did.

‘I clicked the local tweets button, hoping to find someone who had heard about the case. I was ready to tell a complete stranger, in less than 140 characters, that I did know how to load a Ruger .270. But then I saw your tweet and . . . it changed everything. I knew Jordan wouldn’t have wanted me to come clean. You showed me that.’

‘I showed you what?’

‘That sometimes the truth hurts more than the lies. That’s why you’re here, because you couldn’t be honest with your family about the real reason for your trip to L.A. And that’s why I’m here, because I never told anyone what really happened the night Jordan died.’

This time I squeeze his hand and turn his head so he can look at me. ‘What would have happened if you had confessed? You would have been found guilty of manslaughter and you might have still been in jail a year later.’

He’s silent for a moment and I want to ask him what happened that night, but I don’t want to push him. He’s been so patient with me, never pressuring me to open up about the things that happened to me.

‘But you said it yourself, you hate that I saved you,’ he replies. ‘And now you want to die. Maybe I should have just confessed instead of sending you that tweet.’

‘I think the thought of never having met you is worse than what happened to me that night.’ I take his hand and close my eyes as I lay it over my heart. ‘This black box is yours to keep.’

He kisses me tenderly and I slowly lose myself in him. All I can feel is his hand on the back of my neck and the light caresses of his tongue on mine, making my stomach flutter. The way our mouths fit together makes me think of a lock and key. I guess the key I was searching for yesterday was right next to me all along.

Chapter 32: CRUSH – January 5th

‘Come on, or Leroy will kick my ass for keeping him hanging tonight,’ I say, pushing the car door open.

The sidewalk in front of Wally’s is pretty desolate on a Wednesday night at 9:08 p.m. There’s a group of regulars who show up just about every night. As soon as we’re inside, Mikki and I squeeze in at the end of the bar so I can wait my turn, and so I can fill her in on the regulars’ basic information. I don’t want her to feel uncomfortable, like she’s sitting in a roomful of strange men. I give her a quick and dirty profile on John, the accountant who’s in the middle of a messy divorce; Ken, the high-school teacher who sometimes brings his students papers in to grade at the bar while he listens to the music; Rowan, who’s in the music program at Harvard, two years under me; and Elijah, the seventy-year-old saxophone player who once played with B.B. King.

‘Elijah tells the best stories of anyone I know,’ I say as Jimmy slides two glasses of water across the bar. ‘He hardly ever repeats a story either. He has a great memory for that kind of stuff. Sometimes, I wish he would slip up and repeat one of my favorite stories he ever told about his sister who sang backup for Led Zeppelin on one of their US tours, on ‘The Battle of Evermore.’ Her impression of the band was hilarious.’

She’s looking at me with a weird expression. ‘How long have you been playing music? The way you talk about it, it seems like it’s in your blood. Your face just lights up.’

I shake my head, trying not to let her see how her comments have made me feel a bit exposed. ‘I started playing piano when I was six, then I started playing the guitar when I was nine. But my grandpa is the one who gave me an appreciation for jazz and blues. None of my friends were ever really into it, which is why I moved out of the dorms last year. Got tired of annoying the shit out of everyone with my music and practicing. I guess it is in my blood, cause I don’t think I could live without it.’

‘So . . . tell me more about your thesis.’

I chuckle. ‘No, you don’t have to pretend to be interested in my thesis. Let’s talk about something else.’

‘I’m not pretending. I really want to know what you know about music. I want to know the science behind the song you wrote for me.’

‘No. There’s no science behind the composition other than general music theory and the standard stuff anyone can learn in a songwriting course. That’s not what my thesis is about. It’s not about writing a song specifically to draw emotion. It’s about figuring out what it is about music that draws emotion across various cultures.’ I study her face as I let this sink in. ‘The more you try to write something solely for one purpose, the more you lose sight of all the other reasons it needs to be written. So it’s better not to write a song to evoke emotion. It’s always best to write a song for a person. A person is not a purpose, so when you write a song for someone, you give everything up to the song. Those are the kinds of songs that evoke emotion. At least, that’s what my thesis is trying to prove.’

Her eyes well up with tears, which she quickly wipes away. ‘Well, now I really want to hear that song.’

‘Do you want to sit on stage with me?’ She shakes her head as I reach for a bar napkin for her to wipe her tears. ‘Are you sure? I don’t feel comfortable leaving you down on the floor with a bunch of guys. I’d rather have you next to me.’