Page 72 of See Her

“Hey,” I grunt back as I flop down.

“How are you feeling?”

“Like shit,” I respond, plainly.

“You put a lot down last night,” he nods. “Do I need to be worried about you?”

I wave his question away as I take a sip of the hot liquid before swallowing hard and clarifying. “Nah, I just needed a night,” I assure him. Matt worked hard to put this band together, and I won’t let him down. The fact he’s concerned is a sign that I need to get my shit together. I raise my coffee mug and add, “Just a few more of these and my head will be screwed on straight again.”

“Alright,” he nods, and looks me in the eye to let me know he believes me. “And I get it, last night’s performance was a bitch, and I know you miss your girl.”

I nod down at my lap before he speaks again.

“Have you gotten ahold of her yet?”

“No.” I shake my head, regretfully. “I’m worried about it too, man. When I told her about the extension, she seemed to take it well, but that could have been for my benefit.”

“She’ll call at some point,” he tries to console me, just as his phone chimes. He picks it up to swipe at the screen. “Ron just sent us our press coverage from the last show,” he informs me absently as he pulls his glasses from the side table to read the screen.

A couple moments of silence goes by as he reads, and I continue to get the coffee to move the blood around in my veins.

“Everything still going well?” I finally ask and he grins, letting his eyes flick to me briefly before back at his screen.

“Yeah, looks like the crowds are still eating it up,” he boasts, and I give a subtle smile which is all I can manage right now, but I’m trying.

Matt continues to read, slowly scrolling down his screen until I see his features drop slightly and his focus intensifies.

“What is it?” I ask, rubbing at the back of my stiff neck.

He releases a sigh through his nostrils while pressing his lips together. “I think I might know why Mayzie’s not answering your calls.” He looks up at me, finally, as my heart startles and beats to life at a dangerous rate.

“What?” I retort, setting my mug down and immediately reaching for his phone, which he hands over with another heavy exhale.

I take it from him and study the small segment on us that features a couple of photos from last night… one being of me making sure the blonde got inside her room.

I lift my shoulders and shake my head in confusion. “That girl was drunk off her ass and coming onto me. I walked her to her room to make sure she was safe and to get her to leave me alone,” I explain, but my brain must not be making the connection Matt’s is.

“I know, man.” He takes his readers’ back off and sets them down.He wasn’t even there, but he knows me and how insane I am for Mayzie. “But do you realize what it looks like?” He waves his hand, trying to get me on the same train.

I look down at the segment again. The photo is next to the one of Josh and all the groupies he almost made a night of it with. Clearly one of them shot both photos as there was no one else around. The caption alludes to it being some wild night, but I’m just standing there waiting for her to open her door, and…aw fuck!

“Fuck!”I grunt out loud this time as I drop Matt’s phone on the side table and lean over to run my hand through my hair. I don’t know if Mayzie’s seen this, but if she has, I can only imagine what’s going through her mind. I hope to God that she knows me better than that, but this does not look good. If it were the other way around, if it were a photo of her and some guy, I’d be losing my fucking shit about now.

“George and Erin were saying something about this,” Matt muses quietly as I grip at my strands and squeeze my eyes shut against the frustration mixing with the hangover. “How the press can take someone just doing a polite thing and turn it into something ugly.” He shakes his head as I grip the bridge of my nose.

The bullshit train can stop any fucking time now…

“Hey,” Matt says calmly, trying to pull me out of my spiral. “You’ll get a hold of her and you’ll straighten everything out,” he tries to assure me as I push to my feet.

“I gotta try calling her again,” I huff, pushing past a bleary-eyed Josh who’s just emerging from bunk row.

Grabbing my phone out of my pocket, I take a seat on the edge of my bunk and dial my wife again, just to hear it click straight to voicemail, making the painful need to get hold of her all the more desperate.

“Baby, please call me. I need to talk to you,” I practically beg. “You… are the most important thing in this world to me, and I need you to call me back. Please. I love you more than anything.”

35

MAYZIE

---