Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 117415 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 587(@200wpm)___ 470(@250wpm)___ 391(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 117415 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 587(@200wpm)___ 470(@250wpm)___ 391(@300wpm)
Austin, having been working with so many of these people all day, already knows everyone by name and needs no help from me to get introduced. Maybe I’ll save introductions for the Fourth when the whole town convenes in this house to stuff themselves silly with barbecue and watch stuff explode in the sky later.
I don’t know when the heck she arrived or if she’s been here all day and I miraculously didn’t notice, but when Austin is gone to the restroom, Nadine appears before me with a cocktail in hand and, batting her enormous eyelashes, says, “Darlin’, I’m not here to start somethin’, but I’m just gonna say oh my God, my ovaries—that man’s songs does somethin’ to you, does somethin’ deep, deep down to you. I’m pregnant now. From his voice. I am so happy for you, TJ—ugh, you’re cute as a button, you’re so dang cute—and I just think you and this Chase boy are the most adorable, the most precious, the most of every dang most I can think of, and … I think I need another drink right about now and would ya like one?”
She’s already several in.
I’ve only had one and lightweight-me says that’s enough.
I’m handling her just fine, but a quick-footed Jimmy appears to rescue me anyway, directing his mother’s attention elsewhere while shooting a wink over his shoulder at me.
I’ll be seeing them and the rest of the Strongs on the Fourth anyway.
When I’m in the kitchen getting me and Austin another drink, I witness the guitarist Wily in the middle of telling everyone in the whole kitchen a hilarious story about something totally crazy that happened on the tour bus between Alabama and Georgia. I must have missed the punchline when everyone explodes into laughter. From my handful of encounters with the guy, I didn’t take him to be such a charismatic crowd pleaser. Maybe it takes a drink or two to open him up?
Something in the air tonight is simply magical.
I feel like I’m watching someone else’s far more exciting life and this can’t possibly be my own.
I guess Raj and Fiona have gotten super close, because both of them are all over each other on the guest wing couch laughing it up with beers in hand. “No, no, really, it was my fault,” insists Raj through his tears of laughter. “Bitch, you just like takin’ it deep and hard,” she cries back at him, and I may never, ever know the context of that exchange for as long as I live, both of them drunk and in hysterics.
Then a cow moos.
I have no idea how, but it cuts the volume of the room in half. Raj and Fiona go silent. Everyone else in the vicinity seems to take the cue as well, drawing quiet, hushing one another.
It’s Austin’s phone. And it continues to moo.
He sighs by my side, looking down at his phone, as if unsure whether to answer it.
It’s Ian.
“Are you … gonna get that …?” squeaks Raj, nervous.
“Just do it already,” moans Fiona with a roll of her eyes. “If we all just lost our jobs. If the label’s finished. If Ian’s in the hospital now hooked up to life support and still screaming his brains out. Just put us all out of our misery and answer that damned cow.”
Austin gives me a glance, as if it’s my decision somehow.
It totally isn’t. But he looks at me anyway, patient, waiting.
And the phone continues to moo.
I give him an encouraging, supportive squeeze of his arm.
He nods, puts on an eerily pleasant smile, then answers—on speaker. “Mr. Ian. You’re up mighty late. Isn’t it dollhouse hour?”
There’s a long silence.
A very long silence.
Austin glances down at his phone, as if worried he hung up on Ian instead of answering. He raises the volume of his phone to the max. All of us wait. All of us hold our breaths. Even members of the crew hanging around us. Only the distant murmur of others deeper in the main part of the house can be heard, unaware of this agonizing moment of anticipation.
A deep drawing of breath from the phone.
Ian’s breath.
Then: “You motherfucker.”
Everyone stares blankly at the phone.
Fiona and Raj exchange a look.
Austin tilts his head. “So … I’ll presume your daughter … and her precious ears … are in bed … and dollhouse hour’s over …?”
“You … mother … fucker.”
The overconfident glee in Austin’s eyes is starting to crack. He stiffens up, phone lowering slightly in his grip. The first sign of nerves tighten his face. “Ian,” he starts.
“Yeah. Dollhouse hour’s over.” Ian lets out something that’s half a sigh and half a losing-his-shit laugh. “For good.”
Over.
For good.
Fiona’s gaze drop to her near-empty drink in shock.
Raj hasn’t blinked once. His wide eyes are staring ahead at air molecules, watching his future fall apart.