EPIC (Book 1 of the Soundcrush series)

Chapter 13: Rock Stars Get That Look

Kat

While Trace is having his business meeting, I do a little business of my own. Business I'm dreading. I call my friends.

I'm as honest with Laurel and Maddie as I can be, without telling them that I just spent six hours in bed with Trace. That's private.

 I tell them about the limo ride to the hotel, how Trace arranged for my own room, that I've agreed to stay another night. No, Trace and I haven't talked about anything beyond that. Actually, Trace and I have hardly talked at all, except for flirtation and innuendo, but I don't tell them that. Both of them ask for more details. I give them a brief run-down of our past history. I tell them we kissed once, on New Year's. No, we didn't kiss again last night. God no, we didn't have sex.

No, I haven't talked to Colin.

Well, they both already knew that part. They both tell me Colin has been blowing them up, to see if they have heard from me.

"You have to call him, Kat. He's going crazy. He's really sorry about punching Trace. He's really worried about you," Maddie says gently. "And about your relationship. He doesn't know if you're just mad at him, or if you're breaking up."

"I know. I just don't know what to say to him right now."

"I think you do," Maddie says, a little sadly. "You just don't want to say it."

I hang up, relieved that the obligatory calls are over.

I like Laurel and Maddie, but neither one of them are what I would call a really good friend. We just don't have the history. I only met them at the start of my junior year. They've been best friends for years, and although I  really appreciative that they've made space for me in their friendship, and I know it's mostly because of Colin that I am friends with them at all. Maddie and Colin are cousins. I met Maddie and Laurel before Colin, but looking back, I think Colin may have encouraged Maddie to befriend me, so he and I could get to know each other better.

I wonder what will happen to my friendship with them if Colin and I aren't together—especially Maddie. It's not a heart-wrenching dilemma for me, since we are all going to different colleges, but I would be sad to be on bad terms with with them. Or Colin, for that matter. But the fact that I am so calmly considering how to be friends with Colin tells me something. I don't feel for him what I feel for Trace.

That New Year's Eve kiss from Trace showed me something important. Trace couldn't go forward from our kiss, but I couldn't go back.

I keep saying that I'm furious at Trace because of the silence of the last two years, but the truth is much closer to the song he wrote. Don't smile a little Sister, because you think it helps me leave. I told him afterwards that I understood why we couldn't be more than friends, that we were cool, that the kiss was just a drunken mistake—no big deal. That was all fake. The truth is, Trace fired me up with hope, and then he devastated me and that's what I've been mad about all this time—because I was so hurt. I don't want to be Trace's friend. I want to be his...more.

These last two and half years, not seeing Trace...honestly, I was glad. I was glad his parents didn't live next door anymore, I was glad I didn't get any late night drunk dials. I didn't follow Soundcrush's social media, although occasionally I would break down and Google him. I let all of our mutual friends fade. Dropping an iron curtain over our connection was the only way to get over him. Or try. I think I was almost there. Or at least, I had almost convinced myself I was.

Now, eighteen hours of contact with Trace—and I spent six hours of that, skin to skin, wrapped in his arms—and I'm back where I was when when I stood shivering in the sleet on New Year's Day, two and a half year's ago. The way I feel for Trace—it's all or nothing. I want to be his girlfriend, or I want him to be nothing more than a guitar solo on my music app. There aren't enough rubber bands in the world for me to be Trace's friend. I'd probably wear right through my wrist, trying to snap romantic thoughts of him away.