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“Yo,” he answered, and we all smirked, because he was a pretty nerdy looking gay guy and it sounded stupid every time he did it.
“Sure, yep, just landed,” he confirmed, nodding even though the person on the phone couldn’t see him.
“Sounds awesome. I’ll tell them, yep.” He glanced at me. “I dunno about that, we’ll do our best.” He listened for a moment and nodded again. “All right, text the address and we’ll see you later.” Without saying goodbye, he closed the call out and shoved his cell phone back in his pocket.
“Donny Chambers has invited us to an after-party gig later. It’s local, so I said we’d go.”
Scuds shrugged. “We don’t have the first interview until 2:30 p.m. tomorrow, so I’m game.”
Moz glanced at me. “You going?” I already knew this was part of the conversation Fletch hadn’t mentioned; the look of uncertainty he’d given me told me I’d been discussed.
“Sure,” I replied and felt all eyes on me. I went on to tell them about the letter Grace had left for me but left out what had happened afterward with Harper.
“Good job, Cole. I’m excited you’re coming with us. The whole band together,” Moz mumbled with a wide grin.
“No one is ever gonna judge you if you find someone else. I’m sad for you that it’s taken so long,” Scuds informed me in an encouraging tone.
“I’m not looking,” I said, quickly. “For a long time, I was so fucking angry, I couldn’t even contemplate living without Grace, yet here I am six years later, still trying to recover. Reading her thoughts before she died really shifted my views and what she’d said was correct. I can be a shadow of myself and exist, or I can learn to live without her. Unless someone walks the path I’ve been walking, it’s impossible to know how much it affects those of us left behind. But my family is right; it’s high time I got my shit together. Grace isn’t coming back, and no amount of sitting and waiting for a miracle is going to make that happen.”
Watching them all nodding, I reminded myself how fortunate I was to have these guys behind me. Never once had they complained about the disruption I’d caused to all of their lives, nor had any of them become frustrated with me as I worked through my grief. Maybe because they had seen the mess I was.
Setting my overnight bag down on the luggage rack in my bedroom, I checked the three suitcases of clothes already left there for me and wandered in to my adjoining bathroom to take a shower. Once refreshed, I pulled on some shorts and a T-shirt and headed downstairs to relax with the others.
The housekeeping staff had set out a buffet of food and I helped myself to a plateful of pesto pasta and an ice-cold beer.
It had been a long time since it was just the guys and me, and because of my mindset, it had felt more like the old times for a change. Grace wasn’t mentioned once, and listening to them talking about normal life made me realize how much I had missed.
Checking my wristwatch, I noted it was 3:30 p.m.—6:30 p.m. at home. Excusing myself from the group, I took off back to my bedroom to call Layla before she went to bed. We’d negotiated her bedtime to 7:00 p.m. while I was on the road.
Setting up my laptop, I climbed onto my bed, leaned back against the headboard, and hit the icon connecting me to Harper’s Skype with a mixture of feelings from excitement to dread and guilt after what had happened and how I had subsequently left.
Instead of Harper answering like usual, it was Layla’s face that came into view on the screen. From what I could see behind her, I knew she was sitting in my office in front of my desktop Mac.
“Daddy!” she exclaimed excitedly. “Are you with all the band?”
“Yes, I am, Baby.”
“Did you eat yet?” she asked.
“A little. Pesto pasta. What did you have?”
“Noodles, beef and vegetables… and Lemon Drizzly cake.”
“Aw, sounds like I missed a good one. How was school today?”
“So-so,” she replied, and I chuckled at her facial expression like someone had pissed her off.
“How come?”
“Both Jaden and Tom had a fight. They both said I was their girlfriend and Jaden didn’t like it, so he punched Tom on the nose.”
“Wow, you already have the boys fighting over you.”
“Mm-hm,” she replied, “anyway, I told them they were both being silly because it was up to me who my boyfriend was, and they both told me it was none of my business and to butt out.”
I laughed softly and Layla immediately scolded me. “What are you laughing at? This is serious. What if one wins I don’t want?”
“Well, who do you want?” I asked, and she looked at me like I was nuts.
