“You were using me!” I yelled.
The words were finally off my chest.
Years of carrying it like dead weight.
“You fucking used me,” I said in a lower voice.
“Used you? How did I use you, Reed?”
“You wanted out of Nashville. So you tied yourself to me. And I fell for it. I should have seen it happening but I didn’t. I fucking loved you, Abby. I was falling in love with you. Don’t think I didn’t know what was happening. That you were leveraging the band for yourself.”
“What are you talking about?” she asked.
“You don’t have to lie,” I said. “You were working a deal with someone named Chet. Right? Some slimy-ass motherfucker who swore to you he was going to get you into the studio. Right? He was going to give you the biggest hit of the year. All because you were tied to me. To the band. You… Chet… both of you were going to squash us. Use us and leave us. Don’t fucking lie about it either.”
The words poured from me.
It felt good. But it didn’t feel good.
It made me feel like shit. Bringing up that old shit.
Knowing that sometimes the price of fame was quite a bit.
“Chet…” Abby looked offended. “He got to you, didn’t he?”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“He had been pursuing me since before you were in Nashville,” Abby said. “I was told he always had a thing for a woman in her twenties with a dream and a pretty face.”
“Do you know why?”
“Of course I know why, Reed. So he could fuck them. He could fuck them in his bed. And then fuck them in life. I’m not an idiot. You know where I came from, Reed. My mother never wanted me to do this. My brother went off to be a lawyer. And I was the girl running across the country wanting to become a singer.”
“And Chet wasn’t the way to do it,” I said. “And you weren’t going to take down the band in the process. I had to protect myself.”
“Protect yourself from what?”
“You,” I growled at her.
“I was that deadly, huh?”
“You were too trusting,” I said.
Abby laughed and touched the corners of her eyes. “I guess so, right? I went with you, Reed. I trusted you. I never asked a thing from you or the band. In fact, I stayed so far away, they barely even remember me.”
I gritted my teeth.
Abby did keep her distance…
“No,” I said. “I’m not falling for that shit right now. You jumped on the band with Chet in the background of it all. What did he tell you to do to the band?”
“Fuck you.”
“That’s right. That night, honey, I saw it all. He called you and left a voice mail. Saying that he had someone ready to go. That you were going to front your own rock band. It was going to be all men but you as the lead singer. You were going to take the world by storm and change the entire music scene.”
“That’s why you did it? You thought I was using you and the band… for what? What could I have learned from you all? How to swallow whiskey and snort coke at the same time? How to hang my ass out a tour bus window? Or how to take a big gulp of the cheapest vodka and spit fire with a lighter.”
“You watched every show,” I said.
“As a fucking fan,” Abby yelled. “You know what, Reed? I’m sorry I even asked about this. I’m sorry we’re having this conversation. I was better off not knowing. Because this is complete bullshit.”
Abby turned and I hurried toward her.
I touched her arm and she elbowed me.
“Tell me you weren’t talking to Chet,” I said. “Tell me I’m wrong.”
She stood at the door and slowly nodded.
She looked back at me, tears in her eyes.
“Okay, fine,” she whispered. “I was talking to Chet. He would call and pitch an idea. I would think about it for thirty seconds and hang up. How could I not? It was all I wanted. But I didn’t want to lose you. I was confused, Reed. All you guys talked about was fucking women. I had no idea where I belonged. I had no idea if I could handle the life. Knowing you were backstage with some groupies. You’d sleep and I’d watch you. I’d tell myself it would be okay. I mean, what were we, right? Were we even a couple? I had no idea. But it hurt to think about you with other women. Even if it meant nothing.”
“So you’re telling me you loved me,” I said.
“It doesn’t matter now, Reed,” Abby said. “You made your decision. You looked at my phone. You listened to a message that wasn’t yours to listen to. You thought I was going to screw you over. Or hurt the band. Honestly, I had no idea what I wanted to do. I just wanted to be near you. Then you tossed me out of the bus. You left me. I thought it was some kind of fucked up joke at first. But it wasn’t. You went off to become rich and famous. I went off to become… nothing.”
You’re not nothing, honey. You’re amazing to me. I regret what happened that night. I think about it every day. Even if I say I don’t, trust me, I do.
“I don’t want any fucking favors either,” Abby said. She tossed the envelope to my feet. “Whatever the deal is for the other singers is the same for me. I’ll be fine. I always am. I know how to survive. I don’t need you.”
Those four words hurt more than anything else.
Abby left the studio and I grabbed the door to hold it open.
“Abby…”
“No,” she said. “I really need that money, too. I got into some gambling debts and took off on them. The people call me from time to time to fuck with me.”
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing. I’ll handle it. I always do, Reed.”
She was gone a few seconds later.
Then I lost my mind.
I grabbed a chair and started swinging it like a baseball bat.
It might have been thirty seconds or thirty minutes, but when I stopped, I threw the chair and I stumbled back and sat down on the floor. Sweat dripped down my forehead.
The studio was trashed. Bad.
I thought about Abby in trouble with money. Gambling debt. Because of me, I was sure of it.
I found my phone and called Toby.
“Reed,” Toby said. “Everything okay?”
“How much does it cost to build a record studio?”
“What? Why?”
I looked around at the shattered glass, ripped up speakers, and destroyed boards.
“I think I fucked up big time here, Toby…”
“Come here, honey, I want to show you a trick,” I said.
I sat on the edge of the massive leather couch in my living room.
The lights were dim, the music was loud, and the party was on.
Fucking on.
We were celebrating the reaction over the new song. The record company fell in love with it. They were backing up the single with some big-time marketing bullshit. They wanted it to be everywhere. And they wanted us to be out there playing it to fans.
On top of that, Nash came up with an idea to write an acoustic version of it.
The five of us, five guitars, and nothing else.
It was fucking perfect.
It was the point of writing music.
To create something powerful.