Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 69266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 346(@200wpm)___ 277(@250wpm)___ 231(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 346(@200wpm)___ 277(@250wpm)___ 231(@300wpm)
“I’m so pleased to hear that. I’ve been working in weddings for about five years, and it’s where my true passion lies.”
“That’s what I like to hear. Plus, I hate my wedding planner. It was so nice to fire her this morning.”
“How did your mother-in-law take it?”
“Eh,” she said with a laugh. “It was fine. I told her it was fire the wedding planner or we elope, and she came around.”
I chuckled. “I bet she did.”
“So, I’d love to have you on board. You can feel free to send over your contract, or I can share the one that we used with our last planner, which includes a five-thousand-dollar retainer.”
I nearly sank to the floor at those words. A five-thousand-dollar retainer. I didn’t make that much on most of my weddings, period. The Locke-King wedding had paid well, but not like this. Holy shit.
“That would…that would be great. I would be open to either. Whatever you prefer.”
“Excellent. I’m so excited about this. We’ll have to arrange a meeting in the city, so we can discuss everything that’s in the works. You can meet my mother-in-law.”
The mayor of New York City. So casual.
“Thank you for the opportunity.”
“No, thanks for saving my ass,” she said with a laugh.
We said a few more pleasantries, and then I hung up in a state of shock. Then, I screamed and did a twirl.
Eve came hurtling out of the bathroom with a shoe in her hand. “Is it a spider? I’ll kill it!”
I laughed and flopped onto the ground. “I got the job.”
“The job?”
“As a celebrity wedding planner.”
“Oh my God! Nora!” Eve did a little dance and pulled me up into a hug. “That deserves to be celebrated. Ice cream?”
I nodded. “Ice cream.”
And though I was devastatingly happy, the one person I wanted to share the news with was no longer someone I could call. I promised myself it wouldn’t ruin the moment, but I’d lied to myself before.
29
Weston
It wasn’t until the initial rush of excitement over officially joining the band began to wear off that everything hit me with the worst bout of depression I’d had in years. I’d managed it with music, growing up, but the only song I wanted to play now was “Nora’s Melody.”
Even my music had turned against me.
Apparently, I would just suffer for my choice. I’d read Crime and Punishment in high school and never understood Dostoevsky’s point about how guilt could cause such mental anguish that a person would deteriorate. But I certainly understood now, I couldn’t go on like this. I just couldn’t.
So, I’d given up on trying to be okay.
I went to the studio. I still felt strange about walking into a booth this fancy with or without the rest of the band. But it felt necessary. I’d been avoiding the song for long enough.
I sat at the piano and began to work out the full tune to “Nora’s Melody.” It flowed like it had been held captive for weeks. A trickle turning into a stream and then a deluge.
The door creaked open behind me, and my fingers stilled.
“Hey, man.”
I found Campbell in the doorway with his hands in his leather jacket and a look of confusion on his face. “You came.”
“Cryptic message,” he said, entering our sanctum. “After that, how could I not?”
“I need you to do something for me.”
Campbell arched an eyebrow. “What’s that?”
“Listen to this song.”
He toed the door closed behind him and nodded. “All right. What you got?”
Nerves bit into me fresh and raw. I wasn’t sure if I was doing the right thing here. But no matter how many people said that I’d made the right choice, I knew it wasn’t true. Because it wasn’t a choice at all.
It was a theft.
A coward’s way out.
And I’d been a lot of things, but never that.
So, I cleared my throat, prepared for everything that would follow by the end of this. All the consequences to my actions. And I sang.
No one had ever told me that I should be a lead singer. It had always irritated me that I could play ten instruments, but my voice would never match the tunes I could play. But I’d fallen so in love with music that I never really cared. And truthfully, it didn’t matter for this song that I didn’t have Campbell’s crooning voice.
The earnestness to the song made up for the rough vocals. I’d been holding it all back for so long that the song erupted out of me. A volcano pouring lava down a mountainside, flowing freely for the first time in ages.
And by the time I let the last note fade away, I felt as if I’d been exorcized.
We were both silent for a minute. My eyes closed as I held the sustain pedal down to let the last notes linger in the air. A mourning quality to the piece that had never been there before I royally fucked up.