Total pages in book: 151
Estimated words: 145746 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145746 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
“So are you, Tess,” I say. “You’ve been a rock for me more than once, and I want to be that for you, which is why I’m staying.”
Both sets of eyes turn to me, wide and questioning.
“Staying?” Tessa gasps. “What do you mean?”
“When are you breaking outta here?” I ask, resting my chin in my hand and smiling.
“Few days.” Tessa shrugs. “Like I said, they wanna monitor me. Make sure I get a few days of meds in. I’ll meet with my therapist and my psych probably a lot until things level out.”
“I need all of that, too.” I bite my lip and trace invisible patterns on the hospital sheets. “I’ve been slipping myself lately.”
“You have?” Mel frowns. “Are you okay?”
“I’m not manic.” I split a look between my two best friends. “Yet. But I’ve been working too hard. Not getting sleep. I’ve skipped my meds a few times. Not exactly on purpose, but… just with the Dessi shoot and the show I’m developing, I haven’t been vigilant and it shows.”
“Shows how?” Mel asks.
“Let’s just say Sheila saved my ass in the pitch today.” I shake my head. “I could use a few weeks to rest and get my shit together before it gets out of control.”
“And you’d stay here with me?” Tessa’s words are tentative with hope. “In New York?”
“Whatever I need to do can happen here.” I shrug. “With Neevah so sick, we’ll get the last few shots if she gets better…”
My words trail off as the seriousness of Neevah’s condition hits me again.
“When she gets better,” I amend. “Until I have to be back in LA, why not take some time to stabilize, slow down, reestablish my routines. And where better to do it than here with you?”
“Thank you, Gem,” Tessa whispers through her tears. “That means everything to me.”
“I’ve heard of friends’ cycles synching, but this takes the cake,” Mel fake-grumbles. “Y’all not leaving me out. I’m gonna take some time off, too. The three of us in the apartment together will be like old times.”
We share a collective cackle, and though I know Tessa’s not out of the woods yet, and that I need to reestablish the routines that keep me well, I’m clutching these moments with my besties.
“One good thing about my hypomania,” I say, slumping in the plastic chair and letting my head drop back so I can study the ceiling, “I wrote the script I’d been working on for months in two days. You know some of my best work happens this way, but I do feel myself slipping. I’ve been doing this long enough to recognize the signs. Hell, so did Monk.”
“Monk?” my friends ask together, nearly identical looks of surprise on their faces.
“You ain’t told us nothing,” Tessa says. “Y’all together for real, for real?”
“Yeah.” I grimace. “If I didn’t run him off. He asked me to come to New York with him and I wouldn’t. And look, here I am anyway.”
“He’s here?” Mel asks. “Monk’s in New York?”
“Yeah.” I nod. “Working on an album for a few days.”
“Well, why are you…” Tessa pauses when her mother stirs in the corner, and takes back up where she left off in a quieter tone once she resettles. “Why you here with us?”
“Because you’re my girl,” I remind her, squeezing her hand.
“Are you serious about staying with me for a while?” Tessa asks, her smile wavering with the fear and doubt a close call like this leaves in its wake.
“I sure am.” I give her a little wink.
“Then you’ll have plenty of time with us,” Tessa says, offering a watery smile. “You better go get your man.”
FIFTY-THREE
Monk
After a long day working with Cutter, the artist I’m producing this album for, the last thing I should feel like doing is more music, but my brain has other ideas. Thoughts about the Dessi score ran on a backtrack in my mind all day. So here I am, exhausted, sitting at the piano in my apartment instead of collapsing on my bed the way I’d thought I would. The piano faces a wall of glass, and the city glitters down below.
What’s Verity’s view right now?
When I wasn’t thinking about the score, I was thinking about her—about where we go from here. There’s no chance I’m leaving her, but that fight we had… it scared me. You think love conquers all, until you meet an “all” you never counted on and feel completely unprepared for. Verity’s right. I don’t know enough about bipolar disorder to be sure she is entering a manic phase, but looking back, I know what it looked like when we were at Finley. There are too many similarities to ignore. I’m just not sure yet what to do about it.
And like most of the time when I’m not sure, I turn to what I’m most certain of: music.