Page 10 of Sweet Oblivion

I raised an eyebrow. “No way. You know how this world is. I’ll say something that’ll end up in a magazine.”

He frowned. “You think this girl would sell you out?”

I didn’t. But I wasn’t willing to offer her the opportunity either.

Cam called me again a couple nights later, after I’d chatted with Aya. The dude kept in better touch with me than my parents.

“You want to hear who I collaborated with today?” he asked instead.

“Sure.”

“Asher Smith.”

“Are you for real?” I asked, sitting up straight. “Is he badass in real life?”

Cam laughed. “Yes, he is. He’s offered to help produce my next record. What do you think about this riff?

I closed my eyes as Cam played, my fingers moving over a phantom fretboard. The rest of the melody soared through my mind when Cam stopped, mentioning he didn’t have it finished.

I dove toward my guitar and continued playing. The song… It ran through my head, faster than my fingers could move over the strings. The melody built, richer, as more instruments flitted through my mind.

“And you need to add something softer—a harp, maybe? Then the piano chords should be…” I pursed my lips, trying to figure out how to translate from the guitar to the keyboard. “I’ll send it to you,” I said, feeling myself smile. This was it. I’d written a song.

Cam shook his head. He pulled a candy from his pocket and slid it into his mouth. He had a thing for Werther’s. “You just come up with that?”

“Yeah.”

“What’s your dad say about your ability to compose?”

That feeling wrapped itself around my guts as sadness punched me in the throat. It must have shown on my face.

“Nash—"

“It’s all in the family,” I blurted out over Cam, not wanting to hear more sympathetic words. My brother was dead—had been for a while now. I needed to move on. I was moving beyond the crippling grief.

My comment to Cam had once been Dad’s favorite comment to me. “All in the family.” He’d slapped me on the shoulder whenever I played him a new tune, and I’d beamed with pride when my dad used my songs on his albums. All in the family was right. Or it used to be.

“What?” Cam asked.

“Music, composing. It’s our thing. We do it together.”

Cam’s eyes narrowed. “You help him with his songs?”

“Yeah, sure.”

Cam grimaced. “His last album?”

I nodded.

“I’ve never seen you credited.”

I shrugged. “I was young.”

“What about the album he’s working on?”

That feeling intensified, causing my guts to harden. I hadn’t been able to write shit since before Lev died—until today. “Nope, that’s all him.”

Cam grunted, eyes narrowing.

---