I had a pretty good feeling that Hannah was up to something. She wasn’t exactly known for her stealthy skills or her ability to keep her emotions off her face. So, when she’d slunk in earlier, doing a piss-poor job of appearing casual, I’d gone on high alert.
Nothing had happened yet, but I wasn’t ready to accept that I was in the clear.
My eyes darted towards the door for the fiftieth time in the past hour. I dropped my book down on the couch with a sigh. I was so on edge, I’d read the same page ten times and I still didn’t have the faintest idea what it said.
“Want some popcorn?” Hannah asked as she strolled into the room, a big bowl full in her hands.
“You watching a movie?” I asked.
She checked the time on her watch. “I was just gonna see what was on,” she answered vaguely.
“Okay,” I agreed, sliding over so she could sit down.
She grabbed the remote and sank down next to me.
I grabbed a handful of popcorn as the TV screen flickered to life.
Oh. My. God.
The popcorn slipped through my fingers and went all over the couch as I stared at the screen in front of me.
It was Parker. And not some old footage from one of his concerts like I’d accidently witnessed a couple of weeks back.
This was Parker right now. The ‘LIVE’ label on the bottom of the screen was testament to that.
He looked scruffy, like he needed a trip to the barber to sort out his hair and his whiskers, but it was him. And it was even better than I remembered.
“Hannah,” I whispered, unable to look away.
I squeezed her thigh when she didn’t answer. “He needs a haircut,” I mumbled.
“He wouldn’t let me,” she whispered back.
“Hannah…” I said again, totally unsure of what the hell I was seeing.
“He had to do something,” she replied quietly.
What exactly that something was hit me like a ton of bricks.
This is for me.
He was back on his old street corner.
Where it all began…
He was there, his favourite acoustic guitar in his hands and he was playing my song.
He’s showing me how far he’s come.
I hadn’t heard this song in months and my eyes prickled with tears hearing the perfection of it now.
“Han, is this…” I choked out half of a sentence.
Hannah reached for my hand and squeezed. “He’s lost without you, Lotte, he did this for you, because he wants you back.”
I let out a whimper, still staring in disbelief at the screen.
“You’re not happy without him, Charlotte, in fact you’re miserable. And I know you said you can’t live with the fame and his life, but, hun, I think you have to figure out a way, because it seems like you can’t live without him either.”
She was right.
So right.
I’d spent all these months convincing myself I couldn’t live my life under a microscope, but I’d been ignoring the fact that I didn’t know how to be me without him anymore. He made me lighter, happier, and somehow, he made me feel free – even with the constraints of his life bearing down on us.
“How do I fix this, Han?” I asked, finally pulling my eyes from the image of the man I loved.
She smiled and let out a relieved breath, as though I’d just said the words she’d been waiting to hear. “There’s a car downstairs.”
I gaped at her. “He sent a car for me? What if I didn’t change my mind?”
She shook her head quickly and her expression turned all gooey. I knew then that it was Jasper’s doing. Hannah had never made that face about anyone other than him.
“Jasper organised the car,” she confirmed my hunch. “Parker’s plan was just to make you see that he wasn’t all sold out stadiums and groupies.”
We were both on our feet by now; I grabbed my bag and hustled out the door, Hannah hot on my heels.
“I never thought that about him,” I argued. “I just couldn’t find a way to deal with it, Han.”
Hannah hit the ground floor on the elevator and we began our descent.
“Just talk to him,” Hannah encouraged. “You’re my best friend and I love you, but what you did last time damn near killed him. I know you didn’t set out to hurt him, but you never even gave him a chance to try and make anything right,” she told me softly, speaking the words that I knew she’d felt, but had never actually said.
She blames me… and she’s right.
My eyes burned with tears. “I know,” I whispered as we arrived on the ground floor.
The doors opened, but neither one of us moved. Hannah held her finger on the button to keep the doors open.
“Why’d you run, Charlotte? I never understood. You loved him more than anything…” she asked.
“I still do,” I told her honestly, the tears welling again.
“Then why? Was it really just because of the attention he gets from women?”
I shook my head. “It wasn’t all of it, but it played its part. Mainly, I was scared to tell him that it was too much for me…”
A tear slid down my cheek and I wiped it away quickly.
“Can you imagine being the one that Parker gave up this… life for? Gave up music, performing… fame…” I asked her. “Because he would have… I know that man, and I know he would have done that for me.”
I looked into Hannah’s eyes, willing her to understand why I’d done what I did.
“I couldn’t handle it. Me. And I know without a shadow of a doubt that he would have given it all up for me if that’s what it took. I couldn’t do that to him. Music is his life, Han, it means everything to him. I couldn’t let him give it up for me.”
She shook her head gently in disagreement, but her eyes were soft with understanding.
“Look, I get it… I understand what you were trying to save him from,” she acknowledged. “But you’re wrong. Music wasn’t his life anymore… you were. He would have given it up because he loves you more than he loves the music,” she told me softly.
I was his life…
He loved me more than he loved the music…
The words bounced around in my mind.
I’m an idiot.
I could feel myself teetering on the edge of a breakdown.
What have I done?
“I’ve made such a terrible mistake,” I whispered, my voice was so broken I didn’t even recognise it as my own.
“Breathe, Lotte, let’s just get you to Parker. Okay? It’s not too late.” She put her hand on my back and urged me to walk forward; towards the car that would take me to the man I loved.
I sucked in a breath and nodded.
Parker…
He was all that mattered now.