Page 84 of Our Final Encore

I tap the green icon on my phone, and then Dax and Mateo appear on my screen. “Hey, guys.”

“What’s up, dude? I haven’t heard from you in too long,” Dax says.

“I know, I’ve been busy.” I peek over at Opal, she’s now scrolling through her phone.

Mateo’s deep voice cuts into the conversation. “We’re in the studio right now. We were just thinking how good you’d sound on this track. We have a guitar solo that would be perfect for you, man. Do you think you could carve out some time to come down here?”

Dax has enough talent when it comes to the guitar for both of us, in my opinion, but I’m flattered that they thought of me anyway. “I have so much going on right now, I don’t think I’d be able to do that. But another time, for sure.”

They both look disappointed, but Dax doesn’t look surprised. He knows what it’s like to have a family, it’s why he stopped touring, so I know he understands.

“I get it, man. We miss you though, next time you’re close to Austin you should stop by for a jam session.”

“Yeah, definitely.”

Suddenly I hear a loud crash in the background of the call, and a faint feminine voice saying something I can’t make out before I hear her shout, “Alex!”

Damn it.Another conversation I can’t quite understand is had behind the scenes of the call and then suddenly Alexa is plucking the phone out of Dax’s hand and her face is filling the screen. “Why aren’t you here? We miss you, dude. We need your magic on this track.”

I slide my eyes over to Opal and she’s frozen, her gaze stuck to the phone in my hand.

I nervously scratch the back of my neck, trying to figure out how to end this call immediately. “Uh, thanks. I’ve got a lot going on right now, though. I’m kind of taking a step back from music.”

Alexa’s brows furrow together and her mouth pouts. “What? A step back? Why?”

I really don’t have time to get into this right now, and the tension between Opal and I is steadily building with every second I remain on the phone. “Uh, it’s not really something I want to talk about right now. Could you pass the phone back to Dax? I'm gonna tell him bye.”

Opal’s chair screeches against the floor, and the next thing I know her back is to me and she’s headed out of the kitchen as fast as she can possibly walk.Shit.

Alexa rolls her eyes and reluctantly gives the phone back. “Sorry, man, she hijacked my phone.” His tone is light. I’m sure he has no idea that what just happened could be catastrophic for my relationship, if you can even call it that yet.

“It’s cool, dude. I’ll talk to you later,” my voice probably reveals that it isn’t cool at all, but I don’t care right now.

I end the call and slam the phone down on the table before running up the stairs after Opal. I expect to walk in on a war zone, but instead she looks eerily calm, packing her clothes back into the small tote bag she brought with her, and collecting her few belongings from the nightstand next to the bed.

“Hey,” I say quietly, knowing that I’ll sound like an idiot no matter what I say right now.

She doesn’t respond. I know that she heard me, but her expression is catatonic, like there’s a bubble around her that’s separating her from the outside world. From me, specifically.

“Opal…”

She takes a deep breath and steadily lets it out, still meticulously packing her clothes away, tightly folding each shirt so that it all fits. “You still talk to her?”

“No. We haven’t talked in years. Dax and I are still close, but I hardly ever hear from the rest of them.”

She doesn’t respond, just shakes her head, still refusing to meet my stare. “She sounded very happy to hear from you.”

I wince. I’m the biggest fuck up in the universe, even when I try my best to make her happy, everything still manages to get fucked up somehow. “Opal, I promise it’s not like that. I don’t even know her anymore, it means nothing.”

“You’re wrong.”

“What?”

“You say it doesn’t mean anything but it does. It means something to me. Because to me, she represents thatIwasn’t enough for you. That you were happier going off to travel with strangers than you were with me. That fixing our relationship wasn’t worth your time.”

We stand there in silence, the only audible sounds are the waves and seagull calls coming in through the open window beside us.

“I promise that isn’t true. I know it seems that way, and I’m so sorry. But it’s not true.”

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