Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 103281 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 413(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103281 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 413(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
Someone to love him.
“Have you spoken to them since you won the show? Your parents, I mean.” I’d never understand how their hearts didn’t burst open with pride every single day, how they hadn’t ached with love for the precious man in front of me since the day he’d been born.
“No.” He chuckled but there was no humour there. Only pain. “I’ve thought about it, even went back to the house once. Four, five years ago. Didn’t go in. I saw her though, my mum. From the window of my car. Still looked rough as shit. Still drinking, I assumed.” Another chuckle. More pain. “As for my dad, haven’t seen him since he walked out on us. No idea where he is.”
He used to blame himself for that, thought he’d pushed his parents apart, driven his father away. It never even occurred to him that his dad could simply be a selfish bastard.
I reached out, stroked his arm, enjoyed the contented sigh I received in response. “Have you ever been in love, Hugo?”
“Whoa…okay.” He blinked rapidly, like I’d thrown sand in his eyes. “Are you asking me for my body count?”
“No.” I definitely did not want to know that. “I’m serious. I think you have. I’ve heard your lyrics, after all.”
Suddenly, he looked uncomfortable. He cleared his throat, shifted in his seat, pulled his arm just out of reach from my touch. “Some of those were co-written,” he said. It felt like an excuse. “Not every song is based on experience. Sometimes writing is just…fun. Bit of fantasy. Imagination.”
“So, you haven’t?”
“I don’t know,” he said. He inhaled a long breath, released it as a quick sigh. “I don’t think so. I’ve been in a couple of relationships that meant something to me, but I don’t know if it was the kind of love you’re talking about.”
Once he’d said that, I wasn’t even sure what ‘type’ of love I’d meant. Was there more than one? I’d hardly earned a master’s in the subject.
“You mean Courtney Martin?” Courtney Martin was the lead singer of Bittersweet Daydream, and her relationship with Hugo had made the top story on all the gossip columns a couple of years ago. I’d only felt a small amount of irrational hatred towards the woman I’d never met before, at the time. By small, I mean overwhelmingly massive.
“I barely even know Courtney,” Hugo said, tipping his head back and laughing. “We were pictured together, not even touching, at two events and, suddenly, we’re dating apparently. Honestly, I couldn’t even tell you what we talked about.”
“Oh.” I should’ve known better, and I felt certain the embarrassment showed in my cheeks. “Not Courtney, then.”
“No.” His grin never faltered. “There was someone early on, Leanne. She was great. I got in my own way, I guess. Couldn’t open up. Shut it down before it shut me down. Then there was my manager.” He scoffed as he admitted the latter, as if the idea were ridiculous.
“Aimee?” The hairs on the nape of my neck bristled, despite having absolutely no reason to.
“Oh God no. I mean Aims is brilliant, but I don’t see her that way at all. Aimee’s my tour manager. I’m talking about, uh…” he trailed off, swallowed, glanced my way through the corner of his eye. “I meant Drew. You haven’t met him yet.”
Him? “Oh!” Shit. I hadn’t meant the word to sound like I’d just stood on a cat’s tail. “Sorry.” I slapped my forehead. “I’m not even surprised, really. I don’t know what just happened.”
“You’re not?”
I shook my head. “I watched you grow up, Hugo. You always had so much love to give, and I saw how much you wanted to give it. You just didn’t know how. We were horny teenagers together, too, remember? I saw how you looked at people. Girls, boys. Didn’t matter. You always were more about someone’s energy than anything else. Remember Marc?”
“Christ.” He exhaled a snigger. “Yeah, I do.”
I wondered briefly what had happened to Marc, the runner-up from Next Up. The year after the show, he put out a record that didn’t chart well and no one ever heard from him again. “Plus, there’s the whole Freddie Mercury obsession. Your infatuation bordered on unhealthy at one point.”
I giggled as his jaw fell wide open. “Hey,” he complained, “Now you’re just being rude.”
As we fell into a perfect peacefulness, Elton John’s Bennie and the Jets the only sound breaking the silence, everything felt right with the world again. I didn’t feel so small, so alone. Part of me knew it couldn’t last. We led vastly different lives. Soon enough, Hugo would need to jet off to another part of the globe to carry on mingling with the rich and famous, while I stayed behind living my normal-person-life. Still, I didn’t want to think about that. Not yet. When it happened, it was going to hurt, and I wasn’t ready for that level of pain. Not again.