Page 46 of The Duet

“There’s not a lot I wouldn’t do for you, Lana, but don’t ask me to go to some club where they only play the kind of dreadful music that has no decent guitar riff in it and where everyone is at least half my age.” He pats me on the shoulder.

“That’s me told, then.”

Billie looks at me the way Joan used to, when she got me to do something she thought was for the better, but I vehemently disagreed with.

“Can I ask you something possibly delicate, Billie?”

“You can ask me anything you want.”

“Would you not have gotten over the fact that I was sleeping with Cleo pretty soon?”

Billie purses her lips, pretending to give my question a long hard think. “I wasn’t going to break up the band over it, but… other people are sensitive, too. Sometimes, it feels as if everyone else has to do their very best to take your fragile feelings into account while you can do whatever the fuck you want.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Really.”

That’s me told again, then.

“So, you think it’s totally fair that Cleo chose her band over me?”

“Duh.” Billie twirls the neck of her beer bottle between her fingers. “Rule number one of every successful, long-running band. You. Always. Choose. The. Band.”

“I get that you don’t start an affair with another band member’s partner. That goes without saying, although I’m sure it happens all the time.”

Billie gives me a look, as though daring me to continue in this self-serving way.

“What I mean is that, yes, you liked Cleo, but she made it clear to you she wasn’t interested. Just like I have zero interest in Jess. Are those futile feelings really enough to stop Cleo and me from seeing each other?”

“Who are you to decide whose feelings are ‘futile’ or not?” Billie bends her fingers into quotation marks. “It’s not up to you to decide that.”

“Maybe not, but what if Cleo and I have real feelings for each other? Do we really have to ignore them just because we are both in a band?”

“I’m staying out of this one.” Dave holds up his palms when I look at him.

“Do you?” Billie asks. “And what are real feelings compared to what, for instance, Jess has for you?”

“Fuck if I know. I only know what I feel.”

“Which is?” Billie tilts her head. Her gaze on me is soft, making me believe she’s not entirely unsympathetic to my cause. She wouldn’t be here with me otherwise.

“I have feelings for her. She has feelings for me. We slay that duet time after time, apart from tonight. That was quite painful, but it’s also more proof of how we feel. I’m sitting here drinking way too much because… because of what? Some false sense of loyalty she has for her band?”

“No, Lana—” Billie starts, but I cut her off.

“What you’re actually saying is that if you can’t be with Cleo, no one else can. And what The Other Women are saying is that if Jess can’t be with me, no one else can. Don’t you see how utterly ridiculous that is? How juvenile. How incredibly stupid.”

“It’s way more complex than how you just put it,” Billie says.

“I don’t think it is,” Dave says. I could kiss him for backing me up, but he’s really not my type. “Why overcomplicate matters? Lana likes Cleo. Cleo likes Lana. To hell with everything else.”

“Just for the record, I would have given up the wounded bandmate act sooner rather than later,” Billie says. “But I totally understand where Cleo is coming from. You can’t just dismiss it.”

“They’re still so young,” I say on a sigh. “When I was their age, I might have thrown a hissy fit as well. I don’t know. I always had Joan.”

Billie nods, as though she was there when Joan was still alive. She told me she saw us play together a couple of times and that she loved it—always a great way to introduce yourself to me.

“Anyway.” I empty my beer and slam it down with a dramatic bang. “Thank you for talking me out of going clubbing. Truth be told, if I’d gone up to change, I wouldn’t have made it out of my room again.” I send Billie a tipsy smile. “It’s been a day and a fucking half, my friend.”

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