Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 67496 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 337(@200wpm)___ 270(@250wpm)___ 225(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67496 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 337(@200wpm)___ 270(@250wpm)___ 225(@300wpm)
Alex split his time between his dad’s place in Virginia and Micah’s place. Reluctant, even in a global pandemic, to put down roots.
“You want to come back with me?” Micah asked, because he knew his brother was waiting for the invite.
“If it’s cool?”
Little brothers, right?
“Sure.”
“Hey.” Alex grinned. “What’s the deal with the girl?”
“What girl?” Micah asked, standing to pack up his guitars. They had crew for this, but he needed something to do.
“Don’t fuck with me. The charity case.”
Micah bristled but didn’t give his brother the reaction he was after. “She represents a charity. I’m donating money to the charity. That’s all.”
“Didn’t look like that was all when I saw you in the hallway.”
“Don’t be a dick.”
“I’m not.” Alex laughed. “You want to date a civilian, go right ahead. But you know how that works out.”
It didn’t, was his point. And he wasn’t wrong. Band of Outlaws was about to start a world tour and he had no business thinking anything about Helen Larson. It was just that he couldn’t stop thinking about Helen Larson.
“Is she the girl? From the article?” Alex asked.
Micah stared at him, stunned he’d connected the dots.
“I’ve got Google on my phone, man,” Alex said. “I looked up Haven House and it was like the fourth thing that popped up.”
Micah didn’t answer, not wanting to confirm it. Or deny it. Not wanting, really, to look too hard at it.
At the beginning of the pandemic, when the streets were empty and fear was thick in the air, he’d been alone and paralyzed. Absolutely isolated and thinking about drinking. And drinking…drinking was a dead-end for him. Had been since he was fifteen years old. He’d gotten sober after that fight at the Grammy’s, and he was doing pretty good. He went to meetings when he needed to. It helped that Miguel, the bass player was sober, too.
But during the lockdown, alone in his apartment, the urge to drink came back so hard. Impossibly hard. It drowned out everything good in his life, especially the music.
He went so far as to have a beer delivered to his apartment. Pabst Blue Ribbon, the kind his mother drank before it was cool. And he’d had maybe a day left of self-control when he read an article in the New York Times about Haven House.
About Helen.
What had happened to her. Her fiancé. The trucker who’d fucked up and plowed into his car. The court case and the superhuman thing she’d done.
Part of her victim statement had been in the article, and it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever read.
The cloud had cleared and the music came back to him.
It was the second time Helen had saved him.
It felt like fate. She kept showing up when he needed her most.
He had put the beer out on the stoop to be taken by some lucky teenager and written the new album in a fever dream.
“Does she know?” Alex asked.
Micah shook his head. The album was inspired by her. Some of the lyrics were from her victim statement. He hadn’t thought about it at the time, alone in his apartment, when world tours and recording albums felt like they might not happen again.
But now it was all he could think about.
He’d stolen her pain to heal his own.
“Seems like a wasted opportunity if you ask me. You got a real-life muse. Paul McCartney would kick your ass for not immediately marrying her.”
Micah laughed without a whole lot of humor.
“You gonna offer her some money?”
He had. He’d given the charity a hundred thousand dollars. And even that didn’t make him feel any less guilty. Or any less compelled by her.
“Whatever you do,” Alex said. “Don’t fuck her.”
“Jesus, Alex, I’m not going to fuck her.”
“You love complicated shit, man. And this situation has Classic Micah written all over it.”
They stood there, him on the stage, Alex on the ground. Micah remembered when Alex was born and Mom had come home from the hospital, looking tired and worn. Peter was a proud father and wanted to be a part of all of it. Diaper changing. Bottles. The sun already beginning to rise and set on Alex’s tiny, bald, slightly cone-shaped head. It became obvious real fast how this would all play out.
Alex could do no wrong.
Micah couldn’t do anything right.
Whatever Micah had, Alex wanted. And whatever Alex had, Micah disdained. It made for a cage-match childhood.
But Mom had changed everything when she pulled Micah aside when the writing was on the wall and said You have to look out for Alex.
He won’t understand responsibility. He just won’t.
And Micah had known far too much of responsibility. He’d been a man as a boy. Making sure bills got paid and he was signed up for school.
Micah liked complicated because it was all that was left when he was done looking after his brother.