Page 3 of Drum Me Away
I wasn’t either. Of course, to be honest, I assumed hewasgetting laid. Despite the world believing we were the perfect couple, groupies threw themselves at him constantly when we were on tour. Trust me, I’d noticed.
“What if I want more? A family? Marriage? Kids?Love?” That was a lot of emphasis on the last word. And holy shit, I’d never heard Lucas talk like this before. Sure, he hated our ruse, but he’d never said this was why.
“Well, first of all, that isn’t part of your character. A moody, brooding drummer for a rock band does not pine after a wife and kids,” Gabe, the voice of reason, said.
“Yeah, I get that, but everybody has to grow up sometime. I’m not saying I want to quit the band. I’m sick of this stupid persona Dahlia created. I want to be…whoever the hell I am.”
This was not a new argument, although there was a whole lot more passion—and maybe desperation—in Lucas’s words than there ever had been before. How come?
Oh shit, was he secretly dating someone?
The band hadn’t been on tour in eight months. For the first six months of our break, we’d been in the studio, laying down the tracks for our next album. For the last two, we’d basically chilled at our respective homes, doing appearances here and there but actually taking a breather from all the chaos surrounding being the biggest rock band in the world.
During that time, Lucas had disappeared off the radar for about six weeks, reappearing only a few days ago so we could prepare for all these press conferences and then get ready to go on tour.
His absence, and his completely dark social media, were no doubt the catalyst for Oliver’s questions. I should have checked to see what we were up against before this appointment. But like Lucas, I got tired of this charade sometimes too; I just wasn’t as vocal about it.
I’d assumed he simply wanted a break and had gone off to live in a cabin in the woods or some shit, but had he met someone and had been secretly dating her all this time? Now he wanted out of our fake relationship so he could have a real one with her? It made sense.
And it sucked, but I got it. We were never meant to be. I’d been burned enough for ten lifetimes, and I was not willing to take that chance with anyone, but especially not someone I was as close to as I was to Lucas.
“We can stage a breakup,” Lucas said so abruptly I actually jumped a little. “Make it a big, dramatic thing.”
I assumed Gabe was shaking his head, because he said, “Are you out of your mind? Your fans will freak. They’ll take sides. It’ll be you against Faith, and you know how people are; she’ll be the bad guy, no matter what you do. It’ll be a media nightmare. The poor woman will start receiving death threats, mark my words.”
Holy shit, no thank you. Sometimes I got emails from holier-than-thou types who didn’t understand why I showed so much skin or had so many piercings and tattoos and sang about sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll, but that was easy to blow off. Death threats were a whole different ball game.
“Come on, Gabe, we need to do something. I’m at my breaking point here. If we don’t figure out a way to get us out of this fake relationship, I’m going to consider quitting the band.”
Damn, he was serious. He’d never made this thread before. He loved this band as much as the rest of us. Quitting would devastate him.
There really was another woman. A real relationship. And as much as I hated the idea, I needed to help him be with her.
For the record, Ireallyhated the idea.
But Lucas was my friend—or at least, he had been, before we started this charade.
Maybe this wasn’t a bad thing. Maybe we could work together on this whole fake breakup bit, and then we could go back to really, truly being friends.
I pushed the door open wide enough to slip inside and said:
“What if we make it an amicable breakup?”
CHAPTER2
Lucas
My body,without requiring any direction from my brain, twisted around to face Faith.
She stood just inside the conference room, her hands hidden behind her back. She’d changed her hair while I was away. There were streaks of color tucked under the midnight blue; every time she tilted her head, another bright tress popped into view. Purple, magenta, red, orange, yellow, blue, green, an entire rainbow. Wonder how long she’d had to sit in the stylist’s chair for that one.
Wait, no, I didn’t wonder. I didn’t give a shit.
She wore all black, too, which was probably a calculated move to show off the new hair. Tight midriff-baring shirt, body-hugging leggings, and ankle boots with spiky heels. Heavy eye makeup, dark red lipstick, and clunky silver jewelry completed the ensemble.
Total rocker girl.
Faith was one who had no issues letting Dahlia dress her, make her over, tell her how to act and what to do and say. She told me once, early on, when we were still playing our friends’ parties and the smallest dive bars ever, that she was afraid she wouldn’t make it in this industry because she didn’t look the part. That even though her backup vocals were what made Matt’s so freaking on point and the songs she wrote were usually fan favorites, she’d probably get kicked out of the band eventually because her look was holding us back.
