Chapter Twenty-Eight
It happened in a blur. One minute I was in my room throwing clothes into a bag, and the next, I was on a plane to Las Vegas, first class, courtesy of Gold Line Records. Evelyn picked me up at McCarran in a sleek black sedan with a driver. The Strip went by outside the tinted windows.
We were both only twenty years old, but Evelyn was dressed in an impeccable A-line skirt and blazer, while I looked like a pile of laundry in jeans and a sweatshirt, my hair in a messy ponytail.
“Tell me everything,” I said after tense greetings. “The truth. Not the PR bullshit that he was hospitalized for ‘exhaustion.’”
Evelyn scrolled her phone with long manicured nails. “I told you when I called that it was exhaustion because that’s all the world needs to know. Now that you’re here, I can tell you that, yes, Miller collapsed after the show two nights ago. His numbers were very low, but in the ER, they got him stable. Now he’s at the hotel, resting.”
“Collapsed?” My stomach felt as if it were made of stone. “How bad is it?”
“Bad enough that he needs to quit touring, and he won’t,” Evelyn said, finally setting her phone down to give me her full attention. “His doctor says Miller is pushing himself too hard. But he’s determined to finish the tour to give that charity a bunch of money. He feels guilty about all this.” She gestured at the elegant sedan. “And he’s miserable without you. It’s turned him into a bit of a bastard, to be honest. The long distance is too hard on him. You know how he is. He’s all or nothing.”
“I know. He’s going to be just as dedicated to the charity. He won’t want to quit.”
“You have to make him quit. You’re the only one who can convince him. He won’t listen to me.”
I glanced at her sideways, the old twinge of bitterness from our past still hovering between us. “I’ve seen the pictures of you two. You seem pretty close,” I admitted.
“What you’re seeing is a friendship.” She smoothed her hair that was pulled in a tight elegant ponytail. “Despite my best efforts.”
I whipped my head to her. “What does that mean?”
She shrugged. “It means I play to win, always.” She smiled fondly to herself. “My dad likes to joke that ambition is my Gatorade. I would have gotten over our little rivalry, eventually. But then Miller wrote that song for you. So many songs for you. I wanted that too. What girl wouldn’t?”
“So, you arranged to spend the next two and a half years with him to be that girl?”
“He’s gorgeous. Talented. When he sings…” She bit off her words and shook her head. “I wanted that. I wanted to be the girl in the love song. I thought if I stuck around long enough, if I were there for him, I would be. That was my goal, and I never lose.”
“Jesus, Evelyn.”
“But I did lose. Hard. No, that’s not true. To lose would mean he’d been playing the game, and he wasn’t.” She turned to face me. “There’s no one else in his universe but you. Not me or a thousand other screaming girls could ever change that. God knows, I’ve seen women try and fail to get his attention, but he looks right through them. He wouldn’t even entertain the possibility of sleeping with someone else. Which also contributed to him being an asshole, I’m sure.”
“I know. It’s been hard for me too. We promised to try to talk every night but—”
“He is talking to you. Every night.” She scrolled her phone and then held the screen to me. “This was two nights ago. Right before he collapsed.”
A video played, taken from someone just offstage. Miller sat on a stool alone in the center of the stage, a single light bathing him. He played his acoustic guitar solo and sang a song I’d never heard before. “Wait for Me,” a thrumming song of desperation, his rich voice calling out into the dark void of the crowd, over and over again. He was saturated with emotion and longing in a way that only came out in his music. Every word sank into my heart.
“That’s for you,” Evelyn said quietly. “There is no one else.”
The video ended, and she wordlessly handed me a tissue.
I dabbed my eyes. “Thank you for that.”
“You shouldn’t thank me,” she said. “But you don’t have to worry about me anymore, either. I’m going to offer him my resignation.”
“What…why? In the middle of his tour?”
“I have my reasons.” She turned to me. “But he’s got to stop working himself to the bone. He needs you to convince him of that, especially now. His dad’s been calling.”
I stared, my eyes wide. “Holy shit,” I breathed. “Really? Is it… Are you sure it’s him?”
She nodded. “Since the Rolling Stone article came out, Ray Stratton calls almost every day. Miller won’t talk to him. Won’t even hear of it.”
“Oh my God…” I felt pushed back in the seat, my heart aching for Miller. For how confused he must be. Or how much pain he must feel, old wounds torn open when they’d never fully healed in the first place. “He never told me.”
“Because he doesn’t want to worry you about any of it. But I’m worried, Vi. And so is Dr. Brighton.”