Page 51 of Finding Grey
I took a deep breath, determined to stay calm. “I told you, they’re not finished.”
“I certainly hope not,” he said, barking out a laugh. “I can’t release this crap. Half of it’s not marketable.”
“I need to finish developing everything first. After I’m done, I’ll go back and make the necessary changes.”
He looked doubtful. “Do you really believe you can change a few pronouns here and there and no one will be the wiser? Surely, you’re not that naive.” He raised his eyes skyward, as if seeking help from the heavens in dealing with my continued stupidity. “All these years, we’ve both worked to keep all this bisexuality nonsense under wraps. Why the hell would you go and cram it so deep in your new album it will be almost impossible to extract?”
“I can make it work,” I insisted. “I can fix it.”
He shook his head at me. “Why did you write these songs in the first place? Were you trying to impress that boy?” He jabbed a finger towards the gate Sean had disappeared through. “Was your head turned by a pretty piece of arse?”
Launching up from my chair, I glowered at him. “Do not talk about Sean that way—ever.”
“Explain yourself,” he demanded, raising his voice for the first time. “You’ve never felt the need to pull this kind of stunt before, and you were fine.”
“Fine?” I moved away from the table, needing to put distance between us so I wouldn’t be tempted to choke him. “I hadn’t written a single song worth shit in years before coming here. There was no music left in me, no life left. How is that fine?” I asked, shaking my head at him. “You wanted an album worth of hit songs. This is what I had to do to make that happen. I had no other choice. All these years I’ve been strangling half of who I am to make you happy, and it’s been killing the one part of me you value.”
“Don’t be so dramatic,” he said, rolling his eyes. “You haven’t been hiding all this time for my sake. You did it for yourself, for your career.”
“Because you told me it would be too risky to reveal the truth,” I cried, rigid with frustration. “You told me we would lose everything, and I believed you. Do you think I didn’t want things to be different?”
He thrust a finger at me. “That’s exactly what I think. If you wanted a man in your bed so badly, you could have had one. If you wanted to tell the world you’re a bisexual, I couldn’t have stopped you. God knows you’ve fought me on every other damned thing you wanted, but on this one issue you fall silent and then you try to land the blame on my shoulders? Wake up to yourself, Dante,” he scoffed. “You don’t want people to find out any more than I do. You know it could ruin you, andyouaren’t willing to take that risk. If you were, we would’ve had this conversation a long time ago.”
My body set to trembling as I recognised the truth in his words. Iwasscared, terrified, of what would happen if I released this album as my soul intended it to be, but not because of the risk to my career. In truth, I didn’t care how many albums I sold or how many awards I won, not anymore. The thing that had me cowering in the back of my closet was the thought of how people would react—how my fans would react.
I’d always worn therock starlabel with pride. Other labels had been added over the years—drug addict, narcissist, spoiled brat. I’d carried them with ease because they didn’t really belong to me. They were tools for the facade Roger had created, nothing more.
But if I did come out to the world, if I revealed myself as I truly was after all this time, I would be forced to shoulder a whole new set of labels. Bisexual. Queer. Faggot. Fudge packer. Courageous. Heroic. Brave. Some of these labels would fit better than others, but one in particular would be heavy and awkward to bear.
It would describe what I’d been every time I hid the truth. Every time I felt something for a man but chose to walk away.
Coward.
That label would fit like a glove. Because, if I was truly honest, it was the one label I’d given to myself.