Page 7 of Next to Everything We Wanted

I rolled my eyes and gave her a hug. “It could’ve been worse.”

Everyone exchanged goodbyes, and I left the café with the twins.

“I almost died of humiliation,” I told the twins as we walked to the car. “Please don’t embarrass me like that again.”

“Come on,” Emma said, feigning innocence. “It was so funny.”

“It wasnot.” My cheeks burned just thinking about the interaction.

“I’m just happy that he signed my napkin,” Adam said, clutching his napkin to his chest. “Maybe he should sign something of yours, Sienna. Like your sketchbook.”

I scoffed. “There’s no way I’m letting Ivan Hicks near my sketchbook.” My sketchbook was my most prized possession, full of sketches of clothes, my favorite song lyrics, and any other doodles. I’d filled up several throughout the years, but my current one, pink with the Eiffel Tower on the front, was my favorite.

And there may or may not be things about Ivan in there.

Yeah, he definitely couldn’t sign it.

Even if I’d kill to have something signed by him.

“If you say so,” Emma said as I unlocked my red Toyota Camry.

We got in the car, where Emma struggled with her seatbelt. Adam helped her with it, and they high-fived. They had such a great friendship, making me wish I had a sibling close to me in age. With their parents always busy, I was glad they had each other to lean on.

“Can we listen to your Somewhere in the Sky playlist?” Emma asked.

“Sure.” I scrolled through my Spotify, which was full of over a hundred playlists, something Raina had gotten me into. I had one for almost every mood and artist I listened to. When I found the right one, I turned it on before backing out of my parking space.

We belted out every song on the way home. We weren’t the best singers by any means—sure, I could carry a tune, though my singing was nothing compared to my bandmates’ voices—but we harmonized well as Ivan’s voice boomed through the speakers. Even the studio version was lively enough to give me chills.

When we arrived at my house, I changed into comfy clothes and joined the twins in the living room. The three-bedroom house I shared with my dad, one I’d lived in my whole life, was far from big, but it was ours. The twins lived next door to us in a house that mirrored ours.

Emma turned the DVD player on, preparing to watchStarstruckfor the billionth time. I didn’t mind, because it’d been my favorite movie from when I was little. Once I’d introduced the twins to it, they couldn’t stop obsessing over it.

Adam went into the kitchen, returning a few minutes later with two bowls of popcorn before sitting next to Emma on a blanket on the floor. They liked to pretend to be watching a movie outside on the beach with their blankets. When Dad was home from work sometimes on Friday nights, he would join us. It made my family feel complete.

I looked deep into my purse, peeking at the envelope with the letter inside, waiting to be opened. As badly as I wanted to open it for the sake of easing my pain, a fire burned in me whenever I thought about my mother. She was seven years too late to decide that she wanted to talk to me.

“Sienna,” Emma said, her gaze trained on the screen. “Do you think you’ll fall in love with a celebrity one day?”

“Huh?” I snapped out of my thoughts. “What do you mean?”

“You always fall in love with singers.” She turned around and fluttered her eyelashes at me.

I groaned. “For the last time, I’m not in love with Ivan.” Why did everyone have to tease me about my admiration for him? “And no, I wouldn’t. It’s rare for someone to be in a healthy and lasting relationship with someone in the spotlight. Relationships without that aspect are hard enough.”

“But it sounds so fun,” Emma said. “You get to go to all these cool events, get talked about in magazines, get songs written about you. Wouldn’t you love it if Ivan wrote a song about you?”

“Ivan isn’t a celebrity.”But, gosh, does he have the talent for it. The idea of him writing a song for me made something unfamiliar stir in my chest, but I pushed the feeling away. “And I stand by what I just said—it’s too complicated.”

“I don’t know,” Emma said. “I’d love to be Jessica. Christopher’s so dreamy. I can’t believe she ever hated him.”

“I can’t deny that.” I tossed popcorn into my mouth. “But the chances of that happening in real life are slim.” From what I knew, most celebrities only dated other wealthy and successful people. The complete opposite of me. I still didn’t have enough money for fashion school yet, and I’d been working for a year and a half. Even though I enjoyed my job at Stylebrite, the trendy boutique not too far from What Do You Bean, a raise wouldn’t hurt.

“I don’t get the hype with dating celebrities and stuff,” Adam said as he ate his popcorn. My dog, Bailey, put her mouth into the bowl before Adam yanked it away from her. “Like, yeah, it could be fun, but the paparazzi and restrictions would get boring. I mean, Christopher spends the whole movie hiding from them.”

“You guys are killing the fun.” Emma sighed. “I want a singer to look at me the way Christopher looks at Jessica. The way you look at Ivan when he performs.”

I coughed, the popcorn I’d been eating blocking my throat. “I don’t look at him that way. I look at him like I look at everyone else.”