Nik placed his hands on the edge of the sink and studied himself in the mirror.

He wondered what Jenny had seen when she’d looked at him yesterday. Had she seen the man he’d been back when they were together, or had she paid attention to the man he was now? Was there any way for her to tell how exhausted he was or how old he felt?

He ran his hand over his chest, across the tattooed pattern of dots and lines whose meaning people always speculated about and along the eleven scars from where he’d been stabbed repeatedly.

And now he had another scar on his arm where he’d taken a bullet to protect Dred’s child, a move he would make again in a heartbeat—for Petal, or for any of the rest of the band.

Or Jenny.

Nik stepped away from the sink and turned on the shower. The spray hitting the mustard-color tiles was just pitiful. The sooner he could get cleaned up in the third-floor master bathroom, which was in the process of being fitted with as many shower heads as he could cram in it, the better. As much as he wanted to get his hands dirty on the renovation, he was also glad he’d arranged for contractors to come help, ones he knew from his previous life. Without them, the renovation could end up taking him a year. Thank God, too, that the current head of permits for renovations in Toronto had been in care at the same time as Nik.

He didn’t try to explain it to anyone, but there was a symbolism to rebuilding his own home. It made him feel like he was somehow rebuilding himself in the process—stripping himself back to the bare bones, like the walls, and seeing what he was really made of.

Once in the shower, Nik placed his hands on the wall and allowed the hot water to rain down in fits and starts on his head.

He wondered what Jenny would make of the project to renovate his home. When he was eighteen and no longer eligible to stay in care, she’d helped him turn a two-bedroom apartment into a home for him and his brothers, scouring thrift stores for treasures and spending four hours sitting on a sofa that had been dumped on the sidewalk on a bitterly cold February morning until he could find a friend with a van to go collect it.

His goals had been so simple back then:

1. 1. Love Jenny.

2. 2. Make enough money to hold on to an apartment for the rest of the boys and buy food.

God, that first year out of the home had been terrifying yet exciting—and somehow Jenny had made it precious. Even though she’d still been in care, she’d spent as much time with him as she could. They’d lived on ramen and leftovers Jenny had brought with her from the home while Nik had worked two jobs, one on a construction site and one in a bar at the corner of the block. She’d given him her virginity on her sixteenth birthday on a rug the owner of the Greek restaurant below them had given them the week before, and it had been the most perfect thing in the whole fucking world.

Did Jenny look back on those moments with the same fondness he did? They’d been the happiest times of his life. Before the money, and the fame, and the craziness. Before the boy who’d been raised on nothing, the boy who had nearly died, suddenly found himself with wealth and fame and access to just about everything except the maturity and willpower to turn any of it down.

Nik grabbed the shampoo off the shelf and poured some into his hand. He scrubbed at his hair vigorously—anything to take his mind off the events that had followed. Memories of Jenny, the way her skin had felt pressed against his, the way she’d sigh against his lips when she came, and the way she’d wrap her arms tightly around him in the moments after he’d gotten off had kept him wide awake well into the early hours of the morning. He needed to see her again. To check that she was real and not some fucked-up dream.

After he’d finished soaping himself clean while ignoring his growing erection, he turned the taps to cold.

Flowers.

He should get her something nice. Woo her. Show her that he’d learned how to treat a woman properly, despite the way the magazines made it seem.

Quickly, he finished his shower, wrapped a towel around his waist, and grabbed his phone. Within a moment, he’d found a local florist and dialed the number.

“Hello, Flowers by Danni. How can I help?”

He had no clue what he was doing. Shit, what flowers did she even like now? “Erm, yeah. Can you make an arrangement quickly for me please? Something special, like unique flowers and stuff.”

“I have some fabulous white orchids and some late-blooming peonies that would be pretty special together. Do you have a budget in mind?”

“I have no idea. . . . Is two hundred bucks enough. Three hundred?”

The woman on the other end of the phone laughed. “Are you in trouble or in love?”

“Both,” Nik replied quickly.

“In that case, three hundred will make a pretty spectacular arrangement. I’ll put them in an opaque vase, surround them with some folded red ti leaves, and add some lily grass.”

He had no idea what those things were, but he was more than willing to go with whatever she suggested. “I need them in half an hour. Can I give you my card details now so I don’t have to stop when I drop by?”

“Of course. I hope the flowers work.”

“So do I,” Nik said.

When he’d finished giving the florist the credit card number in the name of Monkan Inc., his shell company’s name, he wandered into the second bedroom he’d set up as a temporary closet. He hated the fact he couldn’t just give his own name for this kind of thing, but too many times in the past, people had alerted their friends or the press, or had taken photos of him to use for publicity later. So, the combination of the first half of his last name, and second half of his first was the closest he was ever going to get.

He put on a clean navy Henley, dark denim jeans, and boots and grabbed his keys, phone, and wallet. En route to the florist, his phone rang. He glanced at the car display and saw that it was Preload’s manager. “Hey, Ryan. What’s up?”

“I got a request from the CBC for you that I thought was kind of cool.”

Nik checked his rearview before changing lanes. “Let’s hear it.”

“They bought the Canadian franchise rights to a U.K. show called Who Am I? They want to know whether you would be interested in appearing.”

“I don’t know the show, what’s it about?” Nik said, turning onto the tree-lined street that would lead him straight to the Cabbagetown florist.

Ryan sighed. “It’s a show where the guest, with aid of genealogists and researchers, traces his or her family tree. They think you’ll bring a younger viewing demographic, hopefully getting them interested in the show. And your tree has two uniquely different branches, through your father’s First Nations side and your mom being born in Caledonia.”

Nik’s heart sunk in his chest. He could imagine it now. They’d play up everything traumatic. The way his grandparents had been part of the sixties sweep forcing First Nations children into abusive residential schools. They’d generalize about his life on the reserve, though he barely had any memories of that time. Phrases like “intergenerational trauma” would be littered throughout the episode like confetti. And of course, they’d be all over the fact that his mom had been murdered. Fuck. He certainly wasn’t going to regurgitate it all for the sake of entertainment.

“No,” Nik said. “Definitely not.”

“But it will show a different side of the band, Nik. Not to mention it will redirect your profile away from all the bullshit that’s going on right now with the videos. You have the capacity to be a phenomenal role model. To kids in care, to First Nations people, to the metal industry.”

Nik laughed. Since Ryan hadn’t been around in their early days, he had no idea how ironic the idea was. “For the record, the very first label interested in the band suggested replacing me because the company’s executive said, and I quote, ‘The predominantly white metal audience isn’t ready for an Indian.’”

He could see the moment clearly. They thought they’d made it. Great meeting in a glass-and-chrome office with platinum records on the walls. Then the asshole had cleared his throat and announced that he had a suggestion for them—one he hoped nobody would be offended by. While Nik had been rendered speechless, panic racing at the thought of having to leave the band, it had been Lennon who’d stood up first. He’d just looked at the record company executive, flipped him the bird, and left. The rest had quickly followed.

“Turned out the guy had been born in Quebec and was still pissed about the Oka Crisis.”

“I don’t know what that is,” Ryan said quietly.

“What it always is. Disputed land and some developer who thought a golf course for old white men should take priority over a scared Mohawk burial ground with standing tombstones. Mohawk people versus Canadian soldiers, and nearly three months of chaos, and land claims that are still unresolved. Anyway, that shit still happens all the time. A different group of guys might have made the call to cut me loose so they could get a shot at the big time, but they didn’t, even though I offered to leave.” They’d all gone back to the Auld Spot Pub across the street from their apartment, where Dred had told him he’d rather play small venues with him for the rest of his life than big ones without him. “But, honestly, Ryan, I have no interest in putting everything that happened in my life out for everybody to dissect. If people want to get educated, they can look shit up on the internet.”

There was silence on the other end of the line. It went on so long that Nik began to wonder if they’d lost the connection.

“Think about it, Nik,” Ryan finally said. “I won’t go back to them straightaway. Until I met you, I had no clue what had happened to First Nations people. I know it’s not your job to educate, but I honestly think you could really help educate Canadians who know so little about the act you told me about. What was it, again?”

“The Indian Act,” he said, the very words making him feel ill. His ancestors had been forced to give up lands, ceremonies, and languages. His parents had been Lower Cayuga, Turtle Clan, but Nik didn’t know a single word of his traditional language because his grandparents had been beaten for speaking it in residential schools.

But no, a TV show was not the place to address the hurts. “Ask me again in a couple of days, and the answer is still going to be the same.”

“Okay. I can respect that,” Ryan said. “They’re sending me a contract though, and we have until the end of the month to respond, so let me know if you change your mind.”

Ryan hung up, and the buzz of silence filled the car.

Nik pulled to a stop outside the florist and rested his head on the steering wheel.

Too many pieces of his history were colliding, and he had no idea how to handle it. He stepped out the car and collected the flowers, which were perfect. Getting them into the low rise of his car without breaking stems was tricky, but he managed it. Driving carefully to make sure the vase didn’t tip over on the seat, he made his way to the group home, praying Jenny was actually working today.

He pulled his car up to the curb and killed the engine. His palms were sweating. Goddamn, he was as nervous as the day he’d asked her to go to his prom. The corsage he’d bought her had been cheerful, but cheap—nothing like the flowers he could afford to buy her now. He checked his reflection in the mirror and scoffed at himself. How old was he? Fucking twelve? He grabbed the flowers and walked up the pathway to knock on the door.

Someone on the other side was trying to open the door, which was obviously sticking. When it finally budged, Jenny stumbled backward. “Nik,” she gasped.

The plaid shirt she wore was practical and shouldn’t have been the slightest bit sexy. But the way it nipped in at her waist and the way the couple of open buttons at her collar revealed a hint of the breasts he’d loved to suck on when they made love had him halfway to hard.

“Hey, Jenny,” he said. “These are for you.” He handed her the vase. “I wasn’t sure what you liked now, but I thought these were pretty.”

Jenny pressed her face to them and breathed in deeply, as she always had. She’d loved the smell of flowers. “These are very heavy,” she said.

He had a long way to go to gain her trust, so he wasn’t expecting a declaration of forgiveness, but he’d hoped she’d realize that he’d remembered how much she’d loved flowers or simply say thank you.

“And extravagant. But I don’t feel right taking them,” she held them out toward him. “Go and donate them or take them to Ellen or something.”

The flowers had been meant to open to a conversation, not a disagreement. He refused to take them back. “You don’t need to read anything into them, Jenny. It’s just . . . you were on my mind. And I was so thrown by seeing you yesterday that I made a mess of it.”

Lines furrowed her brow. “So are they meant to be an apology?”

“They can say ‘Sorry.’ And ‘Hello.’ And ‘Welcome home.’ And ‘I goddamn missed you.’”

Her eyes softened. “Nik . . .”

“I remember how much you loved flowers.”

“I do. I did. The ones that grew wild down by the banks of the Don River that you’d pick for me on the way home from that construction job down Lakeshore. The ones I’d put in the glass tumbler.”

Fuck. He remembered those. And that tumbler. He still had it. And the way she used to wrap her arms around him and kiss him to say thank you.

“Look. This is my place of work,” she said. “I know you like to hang out with the kids, but that needs to be the only reason you come here. It might be better if you don’t come around otherwise, because this”—she gestured between the two of them—“isn’t appropriate.”

Even though she didn’t slam the door, this time, the quiet snick of the lock did even more damage to his heart.

* * *

“You got your stuff ready for soccer this afternoon, Leon?” Jenny asked. The scent of the flowers Nik had bought her two days earlier filled the living room where Leon played on the PlayStation.

There was no answer, just a whole bunch of sound effects of a car careening around a corner in some chase.

“Leon?” she asked again, this time more intently. She waited for a moment but was interrupted by a knock on the door. “We aren’t done here,” she said and hurried to get it.

Jenny tugged the door open and made a note to take a plane to the bottom of the door herself. She could shave off the little bit of wood that was sticking.

“Hey,” Nik said. It had been a couple of days since she’d seen him with that huge bouquet, but this time he handed her the tiniest posy of wild forget-me-nots.

The handful of flowers made her stomach flip. She breathed them in deeply. She wanted to be mad but couldn’t. It was a sweet gesture, unlike the gaudy one from the other day.

Before she could find the words or control of her emotions, the gate swung open. Elliott and the boy from the photograph on Ellen’s fridge walked up the driveway. Beneath his shorts, the boy appeared to be wearing some kind of black compression leggings. She’d seen them before on a child in her care in Ottawa who had suffered severe burns.

Ravi ran up alongside her. “Daniel, you made it. I can’t wait to practice with you guys today.”

“Practice what?” Jenny asked, looking at Nik.

“Guitar,” Nik said, lifting the guitar case he carried into the air and turning slightly so she could see another strapped to his back. “Every Saturday that we’re in town or have the chance, some of us come over and teach the kids how to play.” He shrugged as if it was no big deal. “It’s how we got our start, right? And we figured it was the least we could do to give these kids the same opportunity we had.”

Ellen hadn’t mentioned this when they’d done their handover, but the gesture hit her firmly in the chest. It was a wonderful thing to do, and by the way Ravi was bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet, it was something the boys looked forward to.

Elliott handed his guitar off to the boy she now knew was Daniel and stepped up the stairs. “It’s been a long time, Jenny. I can’t imagine a time when Ellen doesn’t run this place, but there’s a certain rightness to you being here.” He opened his arms and Jenny stepped into them, fighting back the tears that threatened to fall.

“I’m sorry I didn’t do a better job of keeping in touch,” she said. While Nik had been the love of her life, Elliott had always been there to help her make sense of it. For the longest time, she had been mad at just about everybody in the band for not telling her sooner about Nik’s indiscretion. But then she had realized that the boys would always have each other’s backs ahead of anyone else’s, and in a way she’d admired that.

Elliott stepped back. “It’s okay. I’m sorry too. I understand. Dipshit ruined it for all of us.” He looked over his shoulder to where Nik stood, his hands thrust deep into his pockets. “Anyway, everybody feels bad, even if it doesn’t seem that way. Hey, Daniel, come over here and meet Jenny. Jenny, this is my son, Daniel.”

“Hey, Jenny. Is it cool if I go hang out with Ravi, please?”

With strawberry blond hair and fair skin, Daniel looked absolutely nothing like Elliott. Besides, she hadn’t been away long enough for Elliott to have had a son that age. “Of course you can.” She stepped to one side so that Daniel could pass. “He’s very polite, Elliott. He’s a credit to you.”

“I only wish I could accept the compliment. But Kendalee and I—that’s Daniel’s mom—only got together earlier this year. She did all the hard work. You cool if I go in and start getting us set up?”

“Please,” she said, gesturing in the direction of the living room. “Go ahead. You know your way around this house better than I do.”

“That I do,” he said with a wink and disappeared inside.

When she looked over to Nik, his face was unreadable. “You’re welcome to come in too.”

Nik didn’t move. “Is it wrong that I’m jealous of my best friend? I hate that you just stepped into his arms when you won’t even look me in the eye.”

For a moment, she felt something desperately close to sympathy for him. She wanted to look him in the eye, wanted to go back to those days when he could turn her on with his heated stare . . . until she remembered why their relationship was the way it was. “While I’m certain Elliot knew what was happening on that tour, he wasn’t the one who cheated on me.” She needed to get things back onto a professional footing. “Look, I’m more than happy for you to come over here and help these kids because Lord knows they need as many advocates as they can get. But please don’t use the time you spend here in some misguided attempt to get us back together. That ship sailed a long time ago.”

Her heart raced in denial.

Nik took a step toward her. “Do you really believe that, Jenny? Without so much as a conversation?” He reached for her hand, and for some reason she let him take it. Nostalgia, or a deep-seated need for his touch she’d tried to bury—she couldn’t decide which. “There is still something here. I can feel it.”

His fingers felt more calloused than they used to, likely hardened from years of playing the guitar. How many other parts of him changed? How much had she changed? “I don’t know how you can say that. We don’t even know each other anymore, Nik. I’m a completely different person from the girl who found out you cheated on her from the cover of People magazine.” She looked over her shoulder to make sure none of the children could overhear their conversation. “I think the past should stay exactly that—the past. It’s unhealthy to get lost back there again.”

Nik looked over her shoulder, reached for the handle, and pulled the door closed behind her. Then he moved even closer, his body lined up perfectly against hers. She could feel the firmness of his abs as he placed his arm around her waist and moved his lips to her ear. His closeness caused her to shiver, and she automatically tilted her head to one side to allow him better access.

“I let you walk away without a fight when I was a messed-up twenty-three-year-old who hadn’t figured out his place in the world. I can wait as long as you need to get your head around the fact that I’m back. I can wait even longer until you trust me again because I know I have a lot to make up for.”

Then he kissed her cheek softly, the way he used to when they’d just made love. When their damp skin was pressed together. As they fought against the breathlessness that used to consume them when they climaxed together. She squeezed her thighs together in response. Then his lips pressed gently against the side of her neck, causing her to shiver. “I’ll see you inside.”

Without another word, he stepped around her, pushed the door open, and disappeared into the home. Jenny reached her hand out for the wall. She felt dizzy, disoriented. Breathless, even.

After she’d been rescued from the cult, she’d suffered from feeling like she was observing the world from outside of herself. “Depersonalization” it had been called, a kind of dissociative episode where she was left observing her emotions rather than feeling them. As though she was having an out-of-body experience.

The first time she’d finally felt anchored back inside of herself had been when Nik had kissed her for the first time. It had rooted her in the present. Given her something real and true to hold on to. In that moment, she’d forgotten about the past.

And she felt it again right now, all the way down to her ballet flats.

Every part of her was mentally screaming to not let Nik back into her life—except one. Her heart remembered the reason why he’d once been her world.

Taking a deep breath, Jenny followed him inside the house.

She wandered into the dining room, where she could hear the twang of guitar strings, some sounding musical, some sounding awful, not that it mattered because there was a smile on every boy’s face.

Her assistant house manager, Simon, came up behind her. “Pretty amazing, isn’t it? Pity we can’t get them this excited about chores,” he said, letting out a booming laugh. “Would make life so much easier around here, wouldn’t it?”

“Doesn’t Leon join in?” she asked, noticing that the boy wasn’t sitting with the rest of them.

“Not so far. But every time before he leaves, Nik spends a half hour with him, even if Leon sits there and says nothing.”

Jenny watched as Nik showed Albi how to play a chord, helping him stretch his fingers across the strings. Mark was sitting in the corner quietly playing along. There was another knock at the door. “I’ll get that,” she said.

She pulled the door open and was surprised to find the one man she’d always been able to count on standing outside. The man who’d once told her that she reminded him of someone, but wouldn’t tell her who, not matter how hard she pressed him.

“Heard you were back and that you may have a kid who guitars just don’t do it for,” Lennon said.

Her throat tightened at the sight of the man who’d been there for her during the lowest period of her life. Even though she knew it would make him uncomfortable, or at least it used to, she stepped forward and gave him a heartfelt hug. She felt him stiffen, and he gently placed his arms on her shoulders to nudge her away. Anybody watching might think he disliked her, but the car in her driveway, as small and uncool as it was, had been all Lennon had been able to afford when Jenny had felt she had no choice but to leave Toronto. And despite his offers to replace it for her over the years, she’d clung to it.

“Lennon,” she said softly. “I don’t know how to thank you for—”

“Don’t . . . Just don’t.”

So she didn’t, out of respect for the man who’d once shared with her just the smallest amount of what his life had been like before he’d come into care. Most of the world might not understand Lennon’s moods and motivations, and she’d read some of the cruel articles about his alleged bad behavior, cool demeanor, and callous attitude, but she understood. Out of respect for the undying loyalty he’d shown her, she would never say a word to anyone.

“I haven’t told Nik,” she said, “in case you are concerned.”

“I’m not concerned,” he said. “If he finds out I knew where you where, then he finds out. . . . So, drums.”

It was clear he wanted to change the subject. In an attempt to be normal and to sweep everything he’d ever done for her under the carpet, she plastered a bright smile onto her face. “If you’re talking about Leon, he’s in the living room. But the rest of the guys are in the dining room learning guitar.”

“Guitars are for pussies who couldn’t hold a beat if their lives depended on it,” he said. “This is where real musical talent lies.” He patted what looked like an electronic drum kit. He had clearly carried all the pieces up to the porch before knocking.

“Do you normally do this on a Saturday?” she asked.

Lennon placed the first part of the kit in the hallway. “No, but I know the guys come and Leon doesn’t join in. So I figured I’d let him give drumming a shot.”

Unable to help herself, she reached out her hand and touched Lennon on the forearm. He jumped and looked down at her hand as if it were burning him. “Why don’t you let the rest of the world see this side of you, Lennon? You’re a good man.”

Lennon shook his head. “Don’t fool yourself, Jenny. I’m the asshole everyone else thinks I am.”

If only he knew that beneath the arrogance she could hear the sadness that filled his words.

* * *

“You’re doing great,” Nik said as he watched the quiet kid, Mark, play the chords they’d been trying their best to teach them today.

What Ravi lacked in talent he certainly made up for in an effort, leaving both Ravi and Daniel in fits of laughter. Daniel may not have been Elliott’s son biologically, but musically he may as well have been.

Nik glanced over toward the doorway. Jenny had gone to answer the door and hadn’t returned. He wanted desperately to finish what they’d started on the porch, to run his lips further along her jaw until they reached those sweet lips of hers and—

“Is this right?” Albi asked as he attempted to play the handwritten notes that Nik had taken the time to prepare the night before.

“Not quite. Here, try this,” he said, mirroring the notes on his own guitar.

The boys had begun to ask when they could play a Preload song, but that wasn’t an easy task, given the adult nature of the lyrics. So Nik had taken one of their older songs and rearranged it with minor lyric changes and a simpler chord structure, making it easier to learn and with a far more PG vocal.

The rattle of a snare drum had everyone immediately looking toward the living room. To the best of his knowledge, there wasn’t a drum kit in the house, something he had considered rectifying but had never gotten around to.

Elliot gave him a questioning look, and Nik shrugged.

“Is that a drum?” Ravi asked.

“Carry on with Elliott for a second, boys,” Nik said.

He stepped into the living room to find Leon still playing the videogame, Jenny sitting on the arm of the sofa, and Lennon sitting calmly on the other side of the room tapping on an electronic drum kit.

What the fuck?

Lennon had never joined them before. In fact, when he’d been asked, Nik specifically remembered Lennon calling kids “little fuckers.”

“You okay there, Lennon?” Nik asked.

“Figured I’d come hang out with you guys. But doesn’t really seem like anybody is interested in the drums,” he said, giving a pointed stare toward Leon.

He’d remembered. The only time they had mentioned their concerns about Leon and his lack of interest in group activities in front of Lennon, they had been on a plane back from Europe. It had been well over a month ago, maybe even two. Nik had never fully understood Lennon’s struggles. Sometimes, he seemed completely disinterested in the world, in their music, and in them as individuals. But every now and then he would pull something out of the bag like this, something so unexpected that it was impossible to not care for the guy.

“Guess I came over here for nothing,” Lennon said and rattled off a piece that sounded easy to the ear but that Nik knew was complex as fuck. “Drumming isn’t for everyone,” he shouted as he continued to play, and Nik could see the way Jenny had to cover her mouth to hide the smile he knew was forming. “Only those who have great hand-eye coordination, for example, can play. It’s way tougher than video games.”

Leon looked over to Lennon but quickly returned to his game.

Nik winked at Lennon. “I guess we got lucky that you came to live with us when you did, then. Otherwise we’d have been fucked.”

“NIK!” Jenny shouted. “That kind of language is not appropriate.”

He looked back at her but could tell the admonishment had been purely to save face in front of the children. “You’re right, Jenny. Sorry. I guess I was just thinking about how great it could have been if we could have gotten another band going in here. You remember how much fun it was, Lennon, when we first started getting those gigs?”

“And how once it started to take off, we were able to make a bit of extra coin on top of our wages,” Lennon added.

“I remember going to the shows. Well, whenever I was allowed to. The leader of my group home wasn’t quite so liberal,” Jenny added.

Leon placed the controller at one side. “You grew up in care?”

Jenny nodded and moved from the chair arm to the sofa near Leon. “Yes, I did. At the same time as these guys. You could say we grew up together.” She looked straight at Nik, her tone wistful.

“Don’t start getting all fucking nostalgic,” Lennon said, spinning his drumsticks. “It wasn’t always perfect.”

“I’d settle for ‘perfect’ every once in a while,” Leon growled, looking back toward the television screen. The pain in the kid’s voice was the clearest indication of Leon’s mental state he’d heard yet. It had taken Lennon showing up to get even that from him.

“On a scale of one to ten, how angry are you right now, Leon?” Lennon asked.

“Fucking eleven,” Leon said.

“You know what I play when I’m feeling a fucking eleven?” Lennon asked. He didn’t answer. Instead, he cracked his sticks together and launched into “Disasterpiece” by Slipknot, the way Joey Jordison did before he got himself kicked out of the band. All arms flying and deadly rhythms.

Nik watched Leon study Lennon as he beat the shit out of the electronic kit.

“When I’m feeling an eight, I play this,” Lennon said, changing to a classic Iron Maiden song. He played a few bars. “A two?” This time it was the big drum breakout from the middle of “In the Air Tonight.” He stopped abruptly and laughed. “Just fucking with you. I never play Phil Collins. But you could, if you wanted to.” He offered his sticks to Lennon. “Want to learn how to beat the shit out of something when you are angry without going to prison?”

It was so inappropriately blunt. And yet it was the perfect thing to get the kid’s attention.

There was a long silence in the room. Nik didn’t dare speak, and it was clear Jenny felt the same. Leon stood and placed the controller next to the TV, looking as though he were about to leave the room. But then he walked over to the drum kit and offered his open palm. Lennon placed the sticks in it.

“Now sit down,” Lennon said, getting up from his seat, “and learn from the master.”

The twang of a really bad chord sounded from the other room, and everybody laughed. “I think that’s my cue to get back to teaching guitar,” Nik said.

When he slipped out into the hallway, Jenny followed. “I couldn’t even bring myself to tell him off for swearing because I’ll take any breakthrough or progress we can get.”

“Lennon has always been a hard one to figure out, but then a part of me sometimes wonders whether he isn’t actually the best of all of us.”

It reminded her of Ellen’s comments about Lennon, that the band hadn’t realized what he brought to the group. Jenny looked toward the door in the direction of the beat that had begun. The sound was a little uneven, but the beat was clear and steady, which gave Nik hope.

“I think you might be right,” she answered. The opening notes of “Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac drifted into the hallway. Elliott was playing, but the song reminded Nik of Jenny.

“You were humming this the day we met,” Nik said.

“I was?”

“Yeah. At that therapist’s office. Do you remember the receptionist used to have that little radio set to some easy listening station?”

Jenny sighed. “Those really weren’t the best times for me. Everything was so raw and so new that it was all I could do to put one foot in front of the other.” She tucked her hands into the pockets of her jeans.

He’d been fifteen; she’d been thirteen with pretty eyes.

“I remember sitting on the other side of the room thinking how much I’d like to get to know you, but you never looked up, at least not at first. But then this song came on and you began to hum the most incredible harmony.”

Jenny smiled sadly. “It’s still my favorite song. But I haven’t sung it in a real long time.”

“It’s part of the reason I came up to you that day in school.” The day he’d seen her wandering around in a daze during lunchtime. The day he’d seen a group of guys in the grade above her calling her stupid names.

He’d run to her before he even had chance to think it through, before he’d taken a moment to consider what a fist to the face of the ringleader might cost him personally. Even Dred hadn’t been able to pull him off.

Jenny sighed, a sound not of frustration but of melancholy. “I know. I must have heard you tell that story a thousand times.”

Even though he knew it was wrong, he stepped toward her until he stood right in front of her, a whisper of air separating them. It might as well have been a thousand miles. “I couldn’t stand the thought of someone bullying you or hurting you because even though I didn’t know anything about you or why you were in that therapist’s office, I knew it must be something serious. It’s ironic—my spending so much time looking out for you to make sure that nobody hurt you, and then ending up hurting you myself.”

Jenny sniffed quietly, ran her fingers under her eyes, and looked around as if to make sure nobody had seen them. “You’re hurting me all over again by doing this.”

“Do you really mean that? Because I would never put you through that pain again. If you really mean it, just tell me again, and I’ll make sure I keep my distance without letting any of the boys down.” He dipped his chin to try to meet her gaze, which was focused over his shoulder. When he finally had it, he said, “Just tell me to stay away, Jenny.”

His words hung in the air. He realized he hadn’t meant them. Staying away would be nearly impossible.

When she didn’t immediately answer, he felt a flood of relief.

“I have work to do,” she said and turned on her heels.

Six hours later, he found himself leaning against the wall by the gate to the group home. He’d killed the afternoon after the guitar lessons by ripping out the interior walls of apartment three with Lennon, Dred, and a giant sledgehammer. Dred had questioned him about Jenny. And Lennon had poked at Dred about everything from the sweater Pixie had made him to being off key as he sung until Nik had had to step in and separate the two of them, playing Dad like he always had. It was getting old.

Finally, the door opened and he watched Jenny shout goodbye to those inside.

“Nik,” she said, when she finally saw him. “What are you doing here?”

“I wanted to walk you home.” It was the truth.

Jenny looked over his shoulder to the garden. “What if I drove?”

“Did you drive?” he asked.

She shook her head. “No. I walked. I live close by. But I’m perfectly capable of walking home and—”

“I know you are. But this isn’t about you; it’s about me. I don’t like the idea of you walking home alone.”

She held his gaze. Again. But finally conceded. “Fine.”

There wasn’t a whole heap of excitement in her tone, but he’d take whatever opportunity she was willing to give him to get to know her again.

The last dregs of daylight colored the sky with streaks of orange and blue. He reached for her hand, but she pulled it away and tucked it in her pocket. The gesture made him smile. When they’d first met, she’d been so self-reliant, so used to depending on herself, that she’d struggled with the basic concept of holding his hand. But he’d convinced her once before that it was fun, romantic, comforting even, and he’d do it again. “So where do you live now?” he asked.

She set out south from the home. “I rented a basement apartment near Church and Maitland in The Village.”

It was a fifteen-minute walk but if he dragged his heels, he could make it last twenty. It felt strange and yet incredibly familiar to walk alongside her. If he was going to win her over, he needed to start from the beginning, but he was reluctant to go back as far as their messy break-up. “What were you doing before you came here?”

Jenny glanced over at him, then faced forward. “I moved to Ottawa after . . . you know, everything went down. The press was painful and everywhere reminded me of us, of you.”

For years, he’d tried to avoid thinking about how it must have been for her because every time he came close, every time he put himself in her shoes, he’d reached for a bottle of anything that would take the pain away or a warm body he could lose himself in, closing his eyes and pretending it was still Jenny falling apart in his arms. A part of him wanted to explain, wanted to tell her why he’d done what he had. It wasn’t pretty. In fact, it was downright fucking ugly. He still hadn’t figured out himself why he was so damn destructive all the time. Not so much to anyone else anymore, but to himself. In fact his behavior was at best polarized, but even as he thought it, he had no idea how to stop it.

The logistics of how she’d managed to start again in Ottawa baffled him. She’d left behind the joint credit card he’d given her, one with a five-hundred-dollar limit because that’s what he had qualified for back then—years before the black Amex Centurion Card that currently sat in his pocket. Nor had she taken any of the money from their account, one she was still named on. He’d kept money in there all these years in case she’d needed it. She’d just disappeared, taking only her clothes, the few personal belonging she’d acquired, and her social work schoolbooks. She’d wanted nothing from him, which hurt second only to her leaving. “That kinda move takes courage, Jenny. What did you do when you got there?”

Memories of being homeless, of being hungry, or being terrified flooded through him. If she’d experienced any one of those, he’d never forgive himself.

“I finished college, although I had to go back and repeat the year I was in once I got to Ottawa because . . . well, I didn’t cope with what happened too well. Couldn’t get up to go to school, couldn’t work on my projects. I finished my final year, and went to work in my first group home. Before I moved here, I was second in charge in a large home just outside of Orleans. Being back here . . . proving I can run a home by myself . . . it’s a big deal for me.”

They reached the busy intersection with Sherbourne, and as the lights changed Nik placed his hand on her lower back. She didn’t jump. In fact, she didn’t appear to notice it at all. But to him the contact was everything he’d missed.

“Why didn’t you tell anybody where you were?” It was the question that had always burned him. He knew that she didn’t have anybody else in the world who cared that she was okay as much as he did.

Jenny stopped suddenly and turned to face him. “Because I knew you would come and find me, and back then I knew I wasn’t strong enough to keep you away.”

Nik’s heart stopped in his throat. The pain in her voice cut him as deeply as any of his stab wounds had. Unable to help himself, he placed the palm of his hand on her cheek. Her face looked so soft, so vulnerable and open. As much as he wanted to kiss her lips, he buried the urge. “I’m sorry, Jenny. I can repeat that a thousand ways, and I can show you a thousand times over just how sorry I am. I just . . .” Just what? Threw it all out of the window in a reckless fit of hedonism?

Self-destruction.

He shut the voice off.

SELF-SABOTAGE.

This time it was even louder.

Jenny pulled away. “It’s probably best we leave all that alone. No point picking at a healed scab.”

“I don’t want to pick at a scab or have you hate me,” he said, sadly. “Or worse, I don’t want you to disappear on me again. I just want to get to know you, Jenny.”

“For what purpose, Nik?” Her eyes filled with tears, and he could feel the pain she was in. It mirrored his own. The pain that drove him to keep holding his makeshift family together so that life had some kind of meaning.

All out of words, he did the only thing he’d ever relied on for comfort. He pulled her into his arms and pressed his lips to hers, lips he’d used to watch as she sung, lips he could visualize around his cock as she’d given him her first-ever blow job, lips that he’d missed. They were soft and sweet, just like Jenny. Her fingers slid into his hair, her nails trailing along his scalp in a way that never failed to make him shiver. She remembered this. Their bodies remembered the way they were together. So did his dick, which was pressed up against her.

He knew it was over the moment her hands slid their way to his chest, and his heart broke all over again as she pushed him away.

“See, this is why I can’t be around you, Nik,” she cried. “It’s impossible to resist you. And we don’t belong together anymore.”

Nik shook his head. “Don’t do this, Jenny. We deserve a second chance to see what we’ve got. We are perfect together.”

“Were, Nik. We were perfect together. Don’t you see? It’s all past tense.” Jenny turned and hurried down the street.

“Jenny. Wait.” He jogged to catch up with her. “There was nothing past tense about that kiss, or the way you turn me on as much as you always did. There is nothing past tense about the way the sun catches your hair and turns it the color of a cornfield in fall. And I know you hate star references but there is nothing past tense about the way your fucking eyes light up your face like Nyah-Gwaheh, your Big Dipper, lights up the night-fucking-sky” he said. “I don’t want what we were to be the sum total of everything we ever add up to.”

“I’m never going to be able to trust you, Nik,” Jenny replied softly, a tear escaping to trickle down her cheek. “No matter how badly I want to. You let me down just like everyone else.”

He paced his hand on her cheek and wiped the tear away with his thumb. “Just let me back into your life, Jenny. Let me earn your trust. I won’t let you down again. Meet me. Have lunch with me. Or coffee. Anything. If you need closure, I’ll give it to you. Just don’t shut me out again. Please.”

Jenny stepped out of his reach. “Fine,” she said. “I’m off next Sunday.”

He had to wait a week, which was good. Because he had a shit-ton of work to do to be ready.