I was doing okay. I went to the gym, I got my nails done. I was tan. I took Tucker on walks and went to art shows and had Josh and Kristen over for dinner once a week—and I did the cooking. I did all of the things—and I was proud of myself.
I’d never gone to grief counseling after Brandon died. Kristen had begged me to go, but I had no interest in learning how to be okay without him. I didn’t want to talk about his death or share it with strangers. I didn’t need to bond with other people going through it to know I wasn’t alone. People died every day, unfairly and prematurely. My tragedy wasn’t anything special. I just wanted Brandon’s hold to let me go when it was ready to let me go. I wanted to feel that grief in its most organic way, like trying to take the edge off it would somehow be dishonoring what he meant to me. But somewhere along the line, it had let me go, and I hadn’t noticed because the tired listlessness that comes with grief had shifted into the kind that comes from losing yourself through depressing life choices—and I wasn’t repeating that mistake.
I wanted Jason’s hold to let me go. I was desperate to shake it. I wanted to do everything I could to make it stop—because he didn’t deserve any grief.
I’d allowed myself exactly one week of falling apart at Kristen’s before I pulled myself up through sheer will, found myself an apartment, and started painting. I slept. I updated my blog. I did yoga. I decorated my apartment and did things I loved—and I chose happiness.
There was a certain dullness to it, though. My “happiness” wasn’t always the real thing. Most of the time it was a fabricated, forced version that cracked around the edges if examined closely enough. But it was the choice that was the accomplishment. I’d finally found the me I’d lost before. I was strong—heartbroken, but stronger than I’d ever given myself credit for. Especially under the circumstances.
It was hard to come to terms with something that didn’t make sense, like a tragic untimely death or a breakup that came out of nowhere. How can you be at peace when you don’t know what you did to deserve it or what you could have done to make things different? I couldn’t wrap my brain around how I’d misjudged Jason to such a high degree, how I could think he was that in love with me, when clearly he wasn’t. It made me question my entire sense of self. Like finding out your hero isn’t a hero at all and you’re just too blind to know the difference.
Right after it happened, I’d had a moment of disbelief. Even though I’d seen Lola half-naked in his room with my own eyes and he’d confessed right to my face, my heart simply wouldn’t accept it, and I’d almost called him. Then I saw the picture of him with her on the motorcycle.
Jason had broken every single promise he’d ever made me. That was his choice. And mine was going to be to thrive despite it.
You can’t control the bad things that happen to you. All you can do is decide how much of you you’re going to let them take. I would be fooling myself if I said I didn’t still love him. I think I’d always be in love with him. But I refused to mourn him or give him a shrine.
Everyone around me knew talking about Jason was off-limits. No one ever mentioned what he was doing. Not even Ernie, during his many visits to check in on me. But a few weeks ago, curiosity had gotten the better of me and I googled him.
I wished I hadn’t looked.
Apparently Jason had gone full rock star since our breakup. He’d trashed a hotel room—kicked in a bathroom door and everything. Then he’d hurt his hand somehow. The tabloids said a fist fight with a roadie. Jason’s crew loved him, so I doubted it. But the article also said he’d broken a fog machine in a rage and Ernie had accidently confirmed it when I overheard a phone call with Jason’s tour manager, so who knew who Jason was these days. He’d ended up canceling three weeks of concerts due to exhaustion and dehydration, and there was speculation that he was abusing drugs and alcohol. I’d seen him passed out myself, and concerts didn’t get canceled unless there was a legitimate medical emergency, so I didn’t know what to believe.
I was worried about him, so I’d asked Ernie. The only time I’d ever asked him about Jason. Ernie told me to let him worry about Jason and to just take care of myself. Judging by how evasive he was, it was pretty clear that at least some of what I’d read was true.
And the Lola/Jaxon rumors were back in the tabloids in full force—only those, I knew for sure, weren’t rumors.
The whole thing made me sick. I wanted to bleach her from my brain. I couldn’t forget her standing there in that doorway in her underwear, so smug. And the universe wouldn’t let me forget it either. Her music, his music, constantly popping up in the grocery store and the gym. I’d started wearing earbuds everywhere, just so I wouldn’t be randomly accosted by it.
It was the most peculiar form of torture.
Jason was capable of things I never could have imagined. He was someone I didn’t even recognize now. Maybe he finally became Jaxon.
The painting that I was going to deliver to the gallery today had been therapeutic. Proof that the six months I’d spent with him had been real. At least at the time.
At least for me.
But it was time I rid myself of the visible reminders of the man I lost. I had enough invisible ones to deal with.
I’d drop off that painting and then I’d go on my first date since my breakup. Kristen and Josh would be there to carry the conversation when this guy bored me, which he probably would.
And I’d get through it—I had to. Because I chose happiness.
I wrapped the painting in brown paper, leashed Tucker, and went downstairs to drop it off and take the dog for a walk.
Twenty minutes later, we were coming back up to my door when I saw a courier standing outside waiting for me. “Are you”—he looked at his device—“Sloan Monroe?”
I wrapped Tucker’s leash around my hand. “Yes…”
“I have a package for you. You need to sign.”
“A package?” I scribbled my name on the digital screen. I wasn’t expecting anything. Kristen maybe?
I took the flat white envelope and let myself into my apartment, examining the outside. There was no name on it.
Kristen. She was always sending me something crazy. Last week she’d mailed me a crocheted tissue holder that looked like a vagina. She was so weird.
I dropped my keys on the credenza and sat on the sofa to open it. Tucker stood in front of me, tail wagging like there were dog treats inside it. “Maybe it’s something for you, huh?” I grinned at him as I pulled out the contents.
And then my smile fell.
I knew the handwriting on the paper instantly, even before I read a word.
A hard lump built in my throat as I scrolled through the letter.
I reached back into the envelope and a shaking hand pulled out the real reason for the delivery.
Two front-row, VIP tickets to a Jaxon Waters concert at 7:00 tonight.
Chapter 42
Sloan
♪ fresh bruises | Bring Me the Horizon
I read the letter Zane had sent me a hundred times. Stared at those four words at the top of the page until they were seared behind my eyelids. Jason lied about Lola.
Zane and Courtney were close.