“The Spinster’s what?” Darcy asks.

“Panorama,” I say, taking another sip of my sparkling water. Liam swore up and down that if I got a cocktail it wouldn’t send him careening downward, but I opted for water anyway.

Everything is beautiful and magical and wonderful, and I’m horrified that I’ll ruin it somehow.

“What is a spinster’s panorama?” Darcy asks. “Is that a single lady who makes a scene out of cardboard and construction paper in a shoe box?”

“That’s diorama,” I say. “Don’t worry, people keep making that mistake.”

Darcy narrows her eyes, thinking.

“You’re right,” she finally says.

“It’s easy to confuse,” I say, taking another sip to hide my nervousness.

It’s only been two weeks with Liam. Two amazing weeks, but it’s still not much, and I get the sense that I’m here because they want to examine me, see if I’m going to drag Liam down again.

“The panorama’s the ocean,” Liam says. “We think.”

“It takes place in the forties, and I think the plot is something about a woman’s love lost at sea to a U-Boat, maybe? And she gets advice from the ghosts who live in her house, because they’re also all women who had lovers that died at sea, back when that happened a lot?” I say, suddenly realizing I’m not exactly sure what the movie’s about.

“Do the ghosts give good advice?” Trent asks, leaning back in his chair, one arm slung around Darcy.

“I’m not sure I’d take it,” I say.

“They’re ghosts for a reason,” Darcy points out.

“Because they’re dead?” Trent asks.

“Because they died with unfinished business,” Darcy says. “And they can’t, you know, chill and let go of it, so they wind up haunting living people like assholes and saddling living people with their problems. That’s what they’d do if they existed, I mean.”

“If you ever quit being a bass player you ought to be a ghost life coach,” Liam tells her.

“Hilarious,” Darcy deadpans.

“Anyway, Frankie was telling us about her job and we got off track,” Trent says, his voice a low rumble.

“Well, mostly my job is to tailor those longish pleated skirts from the forties so that they both look authentic and billow nicely in front of enormous fans,” I say. “Which is more of a challenge than it sounds like, but I won’t bore you.”

Strangely, they keep asking questions, and I keep telling them about the challenges of authentic-but-billowy pleated skirts.

After a bit, I start to relax. I realize that they’re not taking us to dinner because they’re still angry at Liam or because they want to hate me. They have a worn-in feeling rapport, the three of them, and as I go on about sewing I think: everything from before wasn’t bad.

And I also realize: the rest of Dirtshine didn’t want to let him go. I can tell from the way that Liam and Darcy trade barbs, the way he and Trent banter back and forth, that they miss him. They didn’t want things to go the way they did to begin with.

We talk about nothing, but we talk about it for ages. When Darcy asks how we met, Liam and I exchange a quick look and he tells them that I walked into the pub where he was bartending one night because I was tired of my fiancé and needed a proper man.

I laugh.

“Not what happened,” I say. “He was an asshole, I had to talk him into selling me a beer, and if that hadn’t been the only pub for thirty miles I’d have left that very second.”

“That I believe,” Darcy says.

She and Trent tease Liam for being an asshole for a bit, and I help. The food comes. We eat.

“Where are you staying, again?” Trent suddenly asks Liam, leaning forward on his elbows.

The mood shifts, just a little. I’m not sure why.

“Weekly rental just off the five in Pacoima,” Liam says.

“That’s far.”

“It is,” Liam says, shrugging. “But I don’t know anyone there and no one’s ever snorting anything in the halls, which makes it better than the cheap fleabags in Los Angeles proper.”

He doesn’t mention that he’s spent most nights at my place, unless I’ve got to get up too early the next morning for work or he can sense that Chloe is getting too irritated.

Darcy and Trent are just watching him now, the table suddenly tense. We’ve avoided this topic so far at this dinner, the topic of Liam’s sobriety and whether it’s real and whether it’ll stick.

But I guess now’s the time.

“A year and a month, more or less,” Liam finally says. “That’s heroin, anyway. I’ve not had a drink since late November.”

Trent murmurs something encouraging, but Liam cuts him off.

“And I did it by moving to somewhere like Pacoima, where I don’t know anyone and where there’s no one ringing my doorbell wanting to get high. It’s easier that way.”

They exchange a look. From what Liam’s told me I know they’ve been through this all already, with Gavin.

Darcy shrugs at Trent.

“You’ve had dumber ideas,” she said.

Trent looks from Liam to Darcy, and then back. I frown, totally unsure what’s about to happen, but I’m oddly nervous nonetheless.

It’s something to do with the band, I think, heart suddenly fluttering.

“Stay at my house,” Trent says.

Liam goes dead silent and perfectly still. He’s got a fork in one hand, poised over his dinner, but no one at the table moves.

He stares at Trent and Darcy. They stare back at him.

I stay wide-eyed and quiet, because it’s clear that something is sure the fuck going on, and I definitely don’t know what it is.

Is Trent’s guest bedroom filled with giant snakes? Is this actually some kind of invitation to swing with Trent and Darcy? Would there be a ‘one gallon of blood’ fee that I don’t know about?

“I moved in with Darcy,” Trent goes on, his voice low and calm despite the sudden freeze that’s fallen over the table. “So it’s got furniture, mostly, and I’m probably going to use it as a short-term rental for people who are temporarily in town, but I haven’t gotten around to doing that yet. It’s perfect.”

“Your house,” Liam repeats.

“Your house,” Darcy points out to Trent, giving him a significant look I don’t understand.

I feel like I should say that as well, just to fit in, but I keep my mouth shut.

“Yes, my house,” Trent says, leaning forward on his elbows and sounding faintly amused. “It’s got a roof, four walls, the whole enchilada. In the hills right above Los Feliz, not that far from where Gavin and Marisol live.”

My eyes go wider. Those houses are nice, and I nearly kick Liam under the table.

“I can’t,” Liam says. “Thank you, it’s lovely, and I absolutely appreciate the sentiment but it’s a terrible idea, I’d be afraid I’d—”

“What, you’d break a plate?”

“Not exactly.”

“Burn the place down?”

There’s a long pause, and Liam is dead fucking silent.

He did nearly burn a condo down, I remember.

Shit.

“That’s a bit closer, yeah.”

Trent reaches into his pocket and pulls out a mass of keys. We all watch him as he pulls a keyring off, then slides it across the table.

“So don’t,” he says.

Liam swallows. He doesn’t take the keys, but he leans back in his chair, crosses his arms, and looks at Trent.

“Why are you being nice?” he asks. “Why are you being this nice?”

“It’s time,” Trent says.

“The fuck do you mean, it’s—”

“I mean it’s time that I want to give you another chance,” Trent says softly. “You fucking hurt all of us, Liam. You nearly destroyed Gavin’s life again, you nearly destroyed yourself, and Darcy cried so much I thought she might drown—”

“The fuck?” she hisses at Trent.

“—But you hurt me the least, so I think I should start. We’re friends, and we’re bandmates, and you might be an asshole, but dammit, you’re my asshole.”

Darcy nearly spits her drink across the table.

“I could have phrased that better,” Trent says, his voice still perfectly calm.

Liam sighs, his eyes on the keys, dinner totally forgotten as he wrestles with something I can’t see.

“All right,” he finally says, taking and pocketing them. “Thanks, mate.”

* * *

“Okay,” I say, once we’re safely back in my shitty car where no one can hear us. “What was that?”

He buckles his seatbelt and looks out the window, his voice vague, his eyes distant.

“That was Trent being far nicer to me than I deserve,” he mutters.

“Because of... drugs?” I ask, backing out of my parking spot.

“Just say no,” he says, sarcastically, still looking out the window.

I wait. When Liam talks about his past, sometimes it takes him a moment to collect himself, get started. I brace myself, because despite everything, I’m deeply aware that the Liam I know isn’t the same Liam who’s been here in the past.

Well, he is. I know he is. Even when I met on the bridge, my one brief glimpse of this Former Liam, I know I recognized something about him, but it was buried deep underneath layers of that other guy, the one he’s worked so hard to change.

“I already told you about how I set my condominium on fire,” he starts.

I pull up to a freeway on-ramp, blinker flashing, and look at him again.

“I actually don’t remember why I decided to set my condominium on fire, to tell the truth,” he muses. “I’m sure it was a rather good reason, but I can’t bring it to mind just now.”

“I can’t imagine it was anything but well-thought-through and carefully planned,” I say, and Liam just laughs.

“It’s like you know me,” he says.

“You’re afraid you’ll set Trent’s house on fire?”

“It’s a bit more complicated,” he says. “After that, Gavin was already pissed off at me for unrelated reasons, you can imagine I’m sure, but I was out of money and I stayed with a few other friends, but I managed to piss them all off in short order, with my sparkling personality and charming drug habit.”

“Right.”

“I showed up at Gavin’s house, begged him to let me stay there, and he did. He absolutely shouldn’t have, but he did, and he let me stay even after I broke a glass door with my fist because I’d locked myself out and got blood all over his furniture—”

“Ugh.”

“He let me stay even though I was coming back home drunk and high, all hours of the night, this while he was doing his best to stay sober. And eventually I tried to break him and Marisol up, she left, and then I cured him of his sadness with a two-day binge. All because he tried to be nice to me and give me a place to stay.”

Even though it’s fairly late, there’s still traffic, and I brake as the red lights in front of me form a wall.

“Trent’s not Gavin,” I point out. “He won’t even be there.”

“He’s still being much nicer than I deserve.”

“Well, are you gonna fuck his house up?”

He looks out the passenger window again, at a big black SUV, its bass so loud it makes my windows buzz.

“This is the thing about me, Frankie. I never mean to fuck anything up. I’ve got the same intentions as the next person, to live right, to be happy, to, I don’t fucking know, be a good citizen and all that shit. But then I let myself choose what feels easy and good just then over what I know I ought to do, and next thing I know, I’ve burned a condo or broken a window or nearly ruined my best friend’s life or torched a phone number.”

We’re stopped on the 101, and he looks over at me, his green eyes boring into mine.

Slowly, I reach out and put my hand over his, curling our fingers together. I swallow hard, tears forming in my eyes, and I bite down hard on the inside of my cheek because I am not going to fucking cry right now.

He squeezes my hand, half-smiling, and I bite the inside of my cheek a little harder. It’s not working.

“You don’t have to be who you think you are,” I finally whisper.

He doesn’t say anything, just runs his eyes over my face like he’s trying to memorize it.

“And if you don’t think you can trust yourself, fuck it. Don’t. Trust me. Trust Trent, trust Darcy, trust the people who know what you’re really like.”

Liam raises my hand to his lips, presses them against my fingers slowly, one by one. A tear escapes my left eye, tracking down my cheek, and I do my damnedest to pretend nothing just happened.

“I’ll never understand why you’re here but I’m glad you are,” he murmurs. “You’re the fucking moon in my night sky, Frankie.”

I almost say it. It’s right there, because I think I love you, crawling up my throat and trying to get out of my mouth, but I bite it back. Not here, stuck in traffic, not now. Not after two weeks, not when I spent years telling that to Alistair only to break off an engagement.

“This moon says take the keys and stop hating yourself for who you used to be,” I say. “You won’t get better that way, you’ll just get stuck.”

He leans over the center console and we kiss, quickly, my foot firm on the brake.

“Since when the fuck do you dispense self-help advice?” he murmurs.

“As long as I’m not the one asking, I’m excellent at it,” I murmur back. “Give me anyone else’s problems and I can solve them in minutes. Give me my own and it takes years.”

Now his hand is on my face, his thumb right below my lip.

“I think this problem could last a long, long time,” he whispers. “Years, maybe. It might never get solved.”

“What problem is that?” I whisper.

“The problem of us.”

My heart seizes in my chest, nearly stopping, thumping erratically.

“Are we a problem?”

“We’re a puzzle at least, Frankie. Nice girl meets degenerate, sparks fly. Degenerate falls hard. Tale older than time.”

We kiss again. I don’t know what to say, I only know that right now I want to crawl into him, breathless, curl up together somewhere secret that’s only the two of us, away from the world.

He swipes his tongue along my lower lip, and I turn my head slightly, opening my mouth, letting him in because I want this, I want him.

All the fucking time, even when I shouldn’t, I want him.

Behind me, a car honks.

I jerk backward and realize that the red lights in front of me are further away, so I give the guy behind me a sheepish wave and creep forward as Liam laughs.

“You’ll cause an accident,” he teases.

“It would be your fault,” I say, now going at least ten miles per hour on the freeway.

“You’re the driver,” he says, my hand still in his.

He raises it to his lips again, kisses my knuckles.

“Frankie,” he says. “Thank you.”

One more time, I manage not to cry.