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“You motherfucker.”
“More than once.”
“The hell is wrong with you?” Remy asked, punching Val on the arm.
Val cackled and swung his legs off the bed, rising to get out of Remy’s reach. He stretched his arms to the ceiling and yawned. “I have that new song almost done. Want to hear it?”
This was said so casually, so effortlessly, that Remy did a sort of mental double take, where his mind processed the words then had to immediately do so again. He met Val’s eyes and saw recognition there—that despite the yawn, despite the effortless words, Val knew how big a deal this was—yet also wanted, desperately, for Remy not to recognize it as such.
“Sure,” Remy said and shrugged, while his internal organs rearranged themselves. Val was writing again. Val was writing again. Val was writing again—no, wait: Val wasfinishingagain and doing it without drugs. It was the inverse of hearing that Val was using again—a level of joy that would have perfectly mirrored Remy’s devastation.
Val retrieved his guitar, and they went out to the patio, where the air smelled like salt and sugar from the ocean and fallen figs. The patio light was covered in abandoned spiderwebs and attracted purple and yellow moths; Remy swatted them away from his face, while Val walked through them, untouched by feathery wings.
Val took a seat on the table and, without any regard to the hour or the neighbors, launched into a song. Val’s guitar work was the opposite of Vivi’s—loud where hers was soft, demanding where hers was questioning. Still, though, Val’s new song felt delicate to Remy’s ears, something poking its head out of a burrow to see if it was spring yet. All the words were in place, all the melodies, but it still felt fresh. Val’s lyrics were always a sea of metaphors, harder to follow than Vivi’s straightforward, diary-esque songs, but Remy knew it was about saying goodbye. It was a song about saying goodbye to Florida and drugs and even Remy, to a degree.
It was a love letter, from someone to their past.
“It’s great,” Remy said huskily when Val finished. Val looked almost startled; Remy knew his brother had more or less forgotten he was here.
“It’s still getting there,” Val said but grinned. “I’ve got a few others I’m working on. Nothing done. Anyway.” He picked at the guitar for a moment. “What about the songs you were working on with Vivi Swan? Those get done?”
“It was just one song,” Remy said. “And it wasn’t done, really, so I guess it won’t be. I’m not sure.”
“Was it any good?”
Remy felt his lips betray him by curling into a smile. He exhaled. “Honestly, yeah. It was one of those songs that works a thousand different ways—we’d speed it up, or slow it down, change the words. It worked no matter what we made it about.”
“Golden,” Val said.
Remy lifted his eyebrows. “That’s exactly what she called it.”
“We’re twins,” Val mocked, but he seemed good-natured enough about it. He leaned back on his palms, looked at the sky for a moment. It was velvety black, not a star visible, given the light pollution. “Maybe we are twins. Me and the pop princess both keep playing the same old shit. Breakup songs and Quiet Coyote.”
“You’ve both got more to you than that,” Remy said.
“I know. I just wrote new stuff. I contain multitudes, little brother. Does your girl?”
Remy laughed again, the same barking one—it was a laugh for liars. “Hardly my girl.”
“Maybe she’s got multitudes you’re too thick to see,” Val answered, giving him a mysterious look.
“Are you writing lyrics or just being a pain in the dick?”
“Same thing,” Val said. Then, he strummed the guitar and sang, loudly, into the night, “Pain in the dick! I’ll make you fucking sick! I’ll be a pain in yourdick! Hey, one plus one, the arithmetic says I’m gonna be a big pain in your—”
Celeste’s voice screeched through the house, out the door. “My hand to fucking God, I will cutbothyour dicks off if you don’t stop.”
“Sorry, lover!” Val called back then devolved into snickering, whispering laughter that Remy couldn’t help but match.
Vivi Stuns (and not just in her dress)
Singer is apparently still on again with Noel Reid
Vivi Swan appeared at the CMAs with the most surprising accessory of all—boyfriend Noel Reid. For weeks now, they’ve rarely been spotted together, and Noel hasn’t been shy about hitting on other girls. Vivi has a reputation for dating the wrong guy, but come on, girl—even we can see you need to end things with him, no matter how sweetly he can play the acoustic guitar.
The two looked gorgeous though, as per usual, and were arm in arm for most of the night. They even kissed quickly when Noel picked up an award for Single of the Year (shared with country star Waylon Focus, who provided the C to the win’s MA). Interesting, though, that other than that, our cameras never caught them looking at each other. Anyone else sense a new breakup song on the horizon?
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Author: Bianca Treble
