Page 24 of On the Beat

Isla Romero has been gone from the house for three hours and forty-seven minutes. Not that I’m counting. Even if it’s only a temporary reprieve from her presence, I’m still grateful for some peace and quiet.

Blissful solitude should wrap around me like a cloak. Instead, I stare at the ceiling fan, strum my guitar, and consider scrolling through Instagram. Which I can’t do, of course, considering there’s no Wi-Fi in the house.

Now that I think of Instagram, my mind jumps back to the Internet sleuthing I did on Isla at a local cafe. She’s surprisingly stone-walled on social media: her Instagram is set to private with a profile pic that is of her at a graduation ceremony, presumably from college. The grainy thumbnail shows her looking slightly younger, with fewer freckles, wearing a wide smile and red lipstick. Her Facebook revealed similar results, though her LinkedIn proved that she actuallyisa journalist, though with an unspecified specialty. A few Buzzfeed links only revealed listicles, and a personal story that I read.

The story was a familial one, talking about how her parents immigrated from the Philippines and her sense of cultural belonging. That, at least, proves that her story about coming here for a family reunion could be somewhat plausible. Though Paulo also mentioned her by name, my paranoia creeps down my spine with the steady drip of a melting ice cube. There could be some magazine editor ready to pay anyone for a big scoop about me… I can picture the Business Insider hit pieces about to be written…

You’re being too suspicious, Ryder Josiah Black, I can hear my mother scolding me. Paulo is my oldest friend. He wouldn’t betray me.

Isla has to be a fan of my music, or at the very least an extremely dedicated hater, if she came all the way here. So is she, or is she not a stalker?

I get up from my bed and go through methodical motions: pulling the sheets taut, putting my clothes in the dresser, lining up my two pairs of shoes in a neat row. Then, an idea strikes me. Isla isn’t here. Maybe I’ll look and see what she left behind in her room.

If Paulo asks me what I’m doing here, I’ll just say I came to get a better view of the beach. Her room does face the shore at a superior angle.

The closet doors are flung open, hangers askew in her hurry to leave. A floral, citrusy scent—gardenias and oranges—clings to the walls, which are papered over with a palm leaf pattern. Her bed is unmade, but the desk is neat, pencils in a cup, a stack of paper in a neat rectangle. A notebook sticks out of one drawer, disturbing the otherwise tidy tableau.

Curiosity compels me to open it. I frown as I read the words.

Not That Drunk - 3 stars out of five.

I keep reading, trying to discern what I’m looking at.

Not That Drunk is not really a bop. Ryder Black needs to decide what genre he’s writing in, because if he wants to put this song on an album, he should have stayed in Kentucky or moved to Tennessee. What’s next, singing about a whiskey kiss or how much he loves beer? This is a country song through and through. I’d like it better if I was wearing cowboy boots and a denim skirt, but fortunately, I’ve avoided those fashion faux pas. Next.

She wrote an entire review of my debut album and just left it lying around?

What did Isla Romero really come here for?

I shouldn’t be doing this. Not when I accused her of invading my privacy, but something about her writing compels me to keep reading. That, and I can justify it if she’s stalking me. I keep skimming, like a thirsty man drinking saltwater, knowing it’ll kill him but needing to be quenched.

Out of Itisn’t as bad as some reviewers would say. Sure, there’s the typical poppy beats and dance-y track that seems like it would be a good fit at Zara, but it’s catchy as heck. And once you really listen to the lyrics, you get something versatile and clever. Take the following lines, for example: “When am I going to be out of it? / Out of love for you / Out of my head / I thought this drink would get me out of it / But every time I think I’m going to get over you / My heart talks me out of it.”

Something in me punches a hole through me, reading her words in a careful, spidery script. I trace my fingers over the letters, touching the paper like it’s a precious artifact. She listened to my music. Shereallylistened to it, and she had something to say. Not many people really do that, and not enough care, or have the nuance, to critique it in a way that goes beyond the superficialOh my gosh I loved itorUgh, I hate ittype of reviews.

If she is a spy or a music critic or anything else, she’s not the flaky, shallow, gossip journalist that I thought she was. Nor is she the simple hopeless romantic coming to recreate her parents’ love story. Isla Romero is… something else entirely.

And I don’t know what to make of her.

Because after Google searches and deep dives into Facebook, I still know nothing about her, but I have one specific memory. Her. At Skye’s wedding last year. Exactly where neither of us was supposed to be.

* * *

Poppy:Can you bring me my shoes?

I stared down at the text. Never one to consider a witty reply—I preferred to set my comebacks to music—I wondered what freakin’ reason she could possibly have for making this request of me. We hadn’t spoken in eight months at that point, and since I doubted we were on good terms, I didn’t know why she wanted me to bring her shoes.

Except, of course, I would bring them. Why wouldn’t I? I was the brother who visited River in rehab after he left me to drown. I was the brother who did his best to reach out to her, even after she took Skye’s side over mine in our breakup, and wrote thinly veiled exposes about me on her gossip blog for profit.

I was the brother who stuck around blindly, thinking family was always going to be worth more than whatever scraps of myself that fame hadn’t torn away from me yet.

So, being the absolute too-loyal idiot that I was, I swung by her apartment, picked up her shoes, and dropped them off at the Stars on Brand banquet hall. And of course, like a fool, I stuck around for more pain.

After Poppy had accepted the flats I’d given her, changing out of her sparkly butterfly heels for the more comfortable footwear, we exchanged an awkward goodbye, in which she made to hug me and I took a step back, staring out at the other guests.

She nodded at me, sort of like there was some silent agreement we’d made—there was none; there was one I wanted to draft up; there was one I’d already agreed to that we’d never discussed but always expected—and I left the dressing room area of the ballroom, snagging a free flute of champagne on my way out.

At least, I’d thought it was my way out. Instead, I’d taken the wrong exit and found myself at the bar. Finishing my champagne in two gulps, I slid my empty glass across the bar and sank onto an unoccupied seat. Since I wasn’t driving, my chauffeur could at least circle the block a few more times. I doubted he would make it very far, considering the plethora of guests here. “Another one.”

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