I look for the upload date, my heart thudding, goosebumps shivering on my skin. I find it, and discover that Echo uploaded this song less than a week ago.
“Holy shit. Holy shit.” I stare at the screen, scroll down through several pages of videos by Echo the Stars. “She’s fucking incredible.”
That song, though…is it about me? Or her mom? Or…both, maybe?
All I know is, I have to find her.
TWELVE: Alone With My Whiskey and My Regret
Echo
“Echo? Echo! Come on, hon. Get up.” The voice is male, distant, and pissed. The world shakes horribly. “You need to get up, Echo. Our set starts in twenty minutes and you’re not dressed.”
Set?
Shit. The gig. But I’m so tired, and everything hurts, and I’m drunk. Really drunk. My eyes won’t open. The world shakes again, harder.
“Stop…” I mumble. “Stop the…th’ shaking. N’more. No…no more shaking.”
“Then get your ass up, Echo. We can’t do the show without you.” It’s Brayden MacKellan, my band’s mandolin player, my best friend and, right now, my own personal conscience/torturer. “You’re fucking wasted…again.” He manages to pack a hell of a lot of disapproval and disappointment into that one word.
“Hurts.” I blink my eyes, and three of Brayden weave into my field of vision. I try to focus.
“I know, hon.” He kneels down, and even watching him move makes me dizzy. “But you need to get up and get moving. We’re getting paid huge for this. We can’t back out, and we can’t do it without you, so I really need you to figure your shit out, okay? Now come on. I’ve got a shower going for you.”
Ooh. A shower. Yay. I let him help me up, fall against him, smell the coffee on him, and the faint tang of beer and cologne. Mmm.
“You smell yummy, Bray-bay.”
“I know. That’s the smell of sober, Echo.”
“Shu’up, asshole.” I blink at him, both of him…no, all three of him.
He helps me into the bathroom, closes the door behind us, and starts peeling at my clothes. Which are sticky with what might be spilled booze, or possibly my own puke.
“You’re lucky you’ve got me, Echo,” Brayden says. “I don’t think anyone else would do this for you.”
Ben would have, but I can’t think about Ben; I’ve got Brayden, and he’ll have to do.
I nod my head sloppily. “I know. You love me.”
“I sure as hell do. But you’re also lucky I’m playing for the other team right now, because I’m really not sure you can handle the shower by yourself.”
Brayden plays for both teams, so depending on his mood and the day of the week he might be hooking up with a guy, or a girl, or both. It’s complicated, and I stay out of it. Of course, we did have that one night after our first gig together. He was the first friend I made at Belmont my first year, and he was in a straight phase. He’s beautiful, Brayden is, with long and artfully messy brown hair and piercing, expressive indigo eyes. He’s tall and thin, wiry and lean and sort of delicate-seeming, but he has an inner core of strength and an air of careless insouciance.
We realized our musical chemistry was off the charts and started writing songs together, and eventually we booked a gig, nailed the set, and then nailed each other. Which was when he decided to admit to being bisexual, and that he didn’t think he and I would work out long term as a couple, and he didn’t do long term anyway. Which was fine, because neither did I, and he wasn’t what I wanted sexually anyway, being a little too effeminate for my tastes. The little tryst didn’t affect our friendship or our music, and we added members to our band over the next couple years until we became Echo the Stars. The core is still Brayden and I, and we’re hella tight.
I don’t hesitate when he gets me naked and shoves me into the shower.
Which is ice cold.
“BRAYDEN!” I shriek and try to climb out, but he keeps me under the spray until I stop struggling. “YOU ASSHOLE!”
“Chill out, Echo!”
“Don’t tell me to chill out, you dick! This water is like fucking ice!”
Brayden has the gall to laugh, until I stop fighting him and yank him so he nearly falls into the tub with me. “You’re gonna get me wet, and we don’t have time for me to change!” he squeals, thrashing. “Okay, okay!”
“Make it hot, you asshole. And get me some clothes.”
He turns the knob so the water goes hot, and I sigh in relief. The cold water did wake me up a little, though. I’m far from sober, but I’m awake enough to function, at least. And god knows I’ve got plenty of experience functioning while wasted.
I just don’t know how to deal, otherwise, especially now.
I get clean, holding on to the wall most of the time. When I’m out, Brayden has my favorite pair of holey jeans and my favorite T-shirt, and my favorite boots. He knows me. Kind of like a sister, in a lot of ways. Only, he’s a he, and we fucked once. So not like a sister. But still.
Drunk thoughts don’t make any sense.
Bray hustles me out the door and into his Jeep, and he hauls ass across Nashville to the bar where we’re supposed to be playing…ten minutes ago, by the time we arrive. The bar manager is pissed, the rest of the band is pissed, and the crowd is pissed. At least I’m not the only drunk one, now, though.
I weave carefully onto stage, grab the mic and lean into it. Stare out at the crowd, which goes quiet when I appear. Being on stage centers me, calms me. The alcohol buzzes and burns in my blood, boils in my stomach.
“So, I’m kind of wasted,” I admit into the microphone. “Like really hammered. But don’t worry, I can still sing my ass off.”
The crowded bar shakes with the howls of the audience. We’ve built a cult following in the last year or so, which has a lot to do with YouTube and social media—all Brayden’s work—and our kick-ass live shows.
But this, the moment before the lyrics pour out of me, this is where I live.
And it’s something Mom never understood. It’s the cause of our fight. She didn’t want me to start a band, especially because my studies at school do suffer a bit. I’m dedicated to this band, to this life. She wanted me to focus on classical music. Go a more “elegant” route than gigging in dingy bars and honky-tonks in Nashville. She wanted me to…I don’t even know. Sing opera? Go to Broadway? I don’t know. She liked the “classical” thing, and I don’t think she really understood what that meant, or what she really wanted for me. When I started gigging with Echo the Stars, she was livid. She didn’t even want me to go to Belmont. She wanted me to try out for Juilliard or a conservatory. Or go to a university closer to home. Anything but Nashville, anything but a band. I think she knew if I started a band, I’d be less likely to finish school. And damn it if she wasn’t right. The more gigs we book, the more we get paid, the more attention we garner, the less relevant class seems. I just want to sing. I love being on stage with Brayden and Mim and the guys. Nothing matters when I’ve got the mic.