Page 5

“ME, TOO.” GIGI merged onto the interstate and got in the right lane to set her speed.

We sat in that truth for a moment before she shifted in her seat, spine a little straighter, and proclaimed, “ But she’s been having more good days than not, so at least there’s that—and she’s so stoked you’re coming early.

We had to lie to your dad about why I’d be late arriving at the Rev tonight, but I guess you’re worth it. ”

I snorted. “What did you tell him?”

She waved her hand flippantly. “That I had to meet someone at the airport in a pickle costume.”

“And … he didn’t even question it?”

“It’s your dad,” she deadpanned.

I laughed despite myself. “You’re right. It probably went right over his head.”

Gigi dug a hush puppy out of the bag and popped it into her mouth. “Exactly.”

I sank down in the passenger seat. “I just don’t know what I’m walking into, you know?

” I felt embarrassed admitting it. “I talk to her every day on the phone, but it’s different living a thousand miles away.

She can omit things. She has before,” I added wryly, more to myself than to the conversation.

Gigi glanced over at me with a frown. It was the smallest point of contention from Christmas, and I was still a little bitter about it, though Gigi was the only one who knew.

Last summer, after “If You Stayed” hit it big— big big, late-night-show big, Billboard Hot 100 big—I was on cloud nine.

None of my songs had ever broken out like that before.

Wherever I turned, there was the song. It was everywhere, everywhere , the theme song to the soundtrack of the rest of my life.

I loved it so much.

So, when I came home for Christmas, I didn’t see it coming—the news.

The night I arrived, Mom and Dad sat me down as Mitch hovered in the doorway to the living room, and they told me about the last few months while I’d been basking in a rose-tinted world.

They told me about the few times Mom got lost on the way home, and occasionally forgot words, and forgot moments.

Like sand slipping through her fingers, she’d told me.

She got angry sometimes, too, inexplicably so.

And sad. Her emotions seesawed, and sometimes she couldn’t find the words she needed to express them.

Mom and I had gotten into a few more fights over the last year on the phone, but I figured it was just stress from the Revelry, and my job, and …

It wasn’t.

I began to look around the living room then, and the little sticky notes everywhere—lists in the kitchen, reminders of appointments by the front door, calendars in every room. Little things.

Little things that became so much bigger.

The neurologist said she had early-onset dementia.

The verbal kind—the kind that took away your words, your voice, yourself.

They said that Mom should have been much farther along than she was, surprised at how well she functioned, as if she was an old computer found in a back closet, dusted off and plugged in, and not a person.

I think that was the worst part.

“I’ll move home,” I’d suggested immediately, looking at my parents on the love seat. “I’ll live in the guest room and I’ll help out—”

“No,” Mom replied quickly. “No, I would hate that.”

“But you’ll need help—”

“I would hate that for you ,” she corrected. “You moved out there to chase your dreams, heart.”

I was shaking my head, already planning on how to get my things packed into a U-Haul. “I can write from anywhere—”

“But there aren’t opportunities just anywhere ,” Mom said, shaking her head. “Don’t put your life—your dreams—on pause for me. I would hate myself if you looked back in twenty years and regretted it.”

“But …”

Behind me, Mitch shifted in the doorway, and quietly left.

“Your brother’s here, and your dad will take care of me,” she said, and squeezed Dad’s hand tightly. “You’ve worked so hard. Embrace this success. Thrive on it.”

I wanted to tell her that it was silly for her to think I’d regret coming home.

I never would. Mom was my dreams. She was the whole reason I wanted to be a songwriter in the first place, because when I heard she used to sing with the Boulevard back before they were famous, I googled old photos and had found one pixelated image of my mother on stage with the Roman Fell and it imprinted on my young mind.

Mom looked so at home there, I figured that was what happiness looked like.

It didn’t matter that she never talked about her past. That, whenever I asked her about it, she’d give me the same story: that one day she came to the Rev, and she fell in love with Dad, and decided to stay. Music brought her here, led her to her happily ever after. That’s what she always said.

Music would lead me to mine, too. I was sure of it.

She was the reason I did all of this, why I wanted to. Songwriting was as deep in my blood as it was in hers.

But despite being the prolific songwriter I was, I didn’t know the right words to say to tell her exactly that. Mom looked so determined, her mouth set into a thin line, her eyes bright with unshed tears. She wanted this for me.

She wanted me to succeed so, so badly.

So I gave in.

“Okay. I’ll stay in LA.”

And I think it might have been then—just then—that the songs in my soul went out. I didn’t realize it until I got back to LA and the apartment was so empty and I had another song due to a client and … I had nothing. And the more I tried, the quieter my head got until there was nothing at all.

I hated myself for that, because I needed to do this, to make it worth it if I was going to sacrifice all this precious time I could have had with Mom. Time I could never get back.

Time I will never get back.

I guess I could have talked with my parents about my feelings, but they weren’t the type.

They were Olympic-level champions of ignoring things.

They ignored things right up until those same things became bigger things.

Like the leak in the women’s bathroom at the Rev.

And the hole in the roof that turned into a great entrance for a colony of bees.

The hole where a seagull had snuck in to make a nest in the rafters.

And Mom’s forgetfulness.

“And whenever I get on the phone with Mom,” I went on to Gigi, because the words just kept pouring out, “she never wants to talk about it! Even when I ask her. I have to learn about her doctor’s appointments from Dad ,” I stressed, “and you know he never takes notes!” I pushed myself back into the seat in frustration, running my hands over my face.

“I just feel so out of the loop. Helpless. The worst child ever.”

“You definitely aren’t,” Gigi replied soothingly. “I have to remind Mitch about their birthdays. The bar is literally on the ground—and I chose him.”

“Even worse, gross.”

She shrugged. “He’s got talents, too. I mean, the things he can do with his tongue— ”

“ Nope. ” I cut her off before she could go on.

“Seriously, that Duolingo is helping him out with more than just Italian …”

“You’re the worst , you know that?”

She smiled. “Just trying to lighten the mood. They’re so proud of you. They love you, and you love me.”

I pretended to scowl. “Out of necessity.”

“Because I keep your ego grounded, Miss Hitmaker?” she teased.

I scoffed and dropped my hands from my ears. “My ego is always grounded.”

“Says the girl with a Cheeto in her hair.” And she pointed to the orange chunk stuck in my braid.

I snorted a laugh, rolled down the window, and tossed it—but the wind just buffeted it back to smack me in the forehead.

She burst into a howling laugh, so infectious I couldn’t contain a giggle.

I missed her laugh. I forgot how much I did whenever I went back to LA.

It was big and boisterous. It made you want to laugh louder just to keep up.

Georgia Simmons had been my best friend since third grade.

We were ride or die in the way only friends who bonded in the girls’ bathroom during lunch could be.

We had a sort of friendship that wasn’t broken by miles or disagreements or finding out your best friend was doing the horizontal tango with your brother when you came home for Christmas, did laundry, and found a pair of lace underwear she bought the year before on a shopping trip with you.

I had been in the middle of pounding back a probiotic soda and ended up almost dying right there in the hallway as I inhaled it from the shock.

No, Gigi and I were set for life. If she needed to bury a body, the only thing I’d ask was if she had a shovel.

She ran the only singing telegram business within a hundred miles of the OBX, and she was successful enough to have full-time work and a rabid—if small—social media following.

The Unsung Hero was a job she stumbled into in high school when she needed money and her grandma wouldn’t let her work at the Revelry, and she kept at it even when she went off to college.

We both got into Berklee to do the whole music thing, but I was the only one who ended up going even though she had been the one to get a full ride for voice performance.

She defected to Duke instead and graduated cum laude from the business school with a degree in international relations.

If she couldn’t sing, she’d see the world, she said.

But then she found herself back in Vienna Shores, taking care of her grams, and now she was singing in pickle costumes to people at work functions and baby showers.

She was one of the smartest and most talented people I knew.

And unlike me, she came back to Vienna Shores. She stayed.

Sometimes I had to wonder if she ever regretted it, but she never said so, and I never knew how to bring it up. But if she hadn’t stayed in Vienna Shores, she wouldn’t be dating my brother.

Speaking of which—

“So how is my terrible older brother?” I asked, wiping laughter tears from my eyes.