CADENCE
“What the hell are you doing here?” Sarah demands when we return to the apartment to see Hailey standing there.
She takes a step towards me and I flinch, unconsciously backing up, seeking shelter behind my friend.
“Go,” Sarah says to her, her voice angry, growing in volume.
“I have to speak to you,” she says to me, ignoring Sarah. Her eyes are bloodshot and for a moment I can’t help but liken them to my own.
Sarah can barely hide her agitation. “There’s nothing you have to say to her, just go!”
“No, please, Cadence, just five minutes. I have to tell you what happened, and then I promise never to bother you again.” Her voice cracks as she speaks. And I wonder what could have made it that way.
It physically hurts me to be this close to her, but a part of me craves information, yearns to know what happened and why. So I just nod, and Sarah sighs.
I open the door and gesture for Hailey to follow us in.
“Have a seat,” I gesture to a chair by the dining room table. Once she sits, I remind her, “Five minutes. And then I’m going to ask you to leave.”
She nods. “Firstly, for everything that’s happened, I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I had no idea this was going to happen.”
Sarah, who’s standing behind me, scoffs, and I turn to shush her with a look.
“I had no idea she was interested in you guys, I just thought she was a groupie.”
“Who? What are you talking about, Hailey?”
“Gemma, the girl who was with me that night at Patrick’s club, do you remember? Do you remember her being with me?”
That night is such a blur to me, it takes some time for me to rifle through my memories to place a face to the name.
“She was the blonde girl who came with me to hang out at our booth.” She adds and it helps to clear the fog.
“I remember her.” Sarah mutters.
“That night, she said to me that you looked familiar to her, but she couldn’t pick it. I didn’t think anything of it. After that she kept trying to get me to find ways for her to hang out with the band, so I’d invite her out when we went out for drinks or something. Most of the time you and Sebastian weren’t there. But the other night, when she found out about the concert, she practically begged for me to get her backstage. I thought she probably had a crush on Brad or Marius or something. Anyway, during the encore she talked me into going in to wait in the greenroom because surely everyone would go back there after the concert. That’s when you guys came in. We didn’t even have time to tell you we were there, so we just decided to hide out in the adjoining bathroom. I had NO idea she was filming, and no idea what she had planned. I guess the whole time she was just waiting for a chance to use the pictures that she had of you before. I guess she hit the jackpot. It was her, it was all her. I called her a few days ago and she admitted to everything. She even thanked me.” Hailey stops and draws a long breath, shaking her head at her own words.
I can’t believe what I’m hearing.
Literally.
I don’t know if I can trust this woman standing in front of me who I’ve seen as my enemy for so long. Can I trust her with these revelations she’s just dropped on me? I don’t know what to say.
Sarah doesn’t have the same restraint.
“I don’t believe you.” She says, narrowing her eyes.
Hailey turns to her, “I’m sorry, I don’t know what else to tell you, but it’s all true.”
“I heard you that night, Hailey, in the bathroom, you were bragging about having slept with half the band and that you were going to try to score with Sebastian that night.” Sarah accuses her.
The sound of his name makes me flinch and my breath catch. Images of him and her intertwined flash in my mind. I turn to Hailey and she looks at me, her jaw locked, speechless.
Then she takes a breath and closes her eyes.
“I lied. About all of it. None of that was true.”
I stand up, facing her, the frustration taking a hold of me.
“So Gemma lied about being an undercover pap. Now you tell us you lied about fucking half the band. Maybe you’re lying now, Hailey! What’s the truth? What am I supposed to believe?”
“I’m not. I promise you, I’m not. I...”
“You’re what, Hailey? You’re going to have to give me something, or else you need to leave. Were you trying to score with Sebastian or not? Or is everything you’ve just told us to cover your own ass?”
“I’m GAY!” Hailey shouts and stands up, her eyes glistening, “I am gay,” she repeats, her voice softer.
“What?” I stare at her.
“I have absolute no interest in Seb or the band or any man for that matter. I am gay and I always have been.”
And the revelations just keep coming. I sit back and watch her for a second. She’s trembling and I wonder how many times she’s had to tell someone what she’s just told us.
“Do the guys know?” I ask.
“Yes. And they were sworn to secrecy. I’ve known them half my life...they know everything about me, and yes, they know I’m gay. And they know that it’s up to me if I want someone to know or not.”
And then it dawns on me.
“So Sebastian...”
“Was just keeping his word to me.”
“Even if...”
“Even if it meant losing you, yes.”
The news doesn’t make it any easier.
“But it was never about choosing between you and me. It was about keeping his word. He doesn’t have anything if not his integrity. You should know that. But I can’t do that to him. Keeping my secret can’t be the reason that he loses you.”
“But...why did you say all that stuff to Gemma?” Sarah comes up behind me, trying to find her own answers.
“I don’t know. I guess I just felt like she was starting to get an inkling, and in some twisted way I wanted her to think I was cool. I haven’t had a lot of female friends and I guess I just wanted her to like me. I had no idea that she was really just using me the whole time.”
“Oh, Hailey.” I can’t help but feel for her. Living the life she does, mixing with famous people, never really knowing who to trust.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry about the pictures, I’m sorry about you and Sebastian, but I’ll do anything I can to fix it.”
“You’re...not in love with Sebastian?” I have to ask, one last time.
“No. I love him like a brother, like I do all of them, but nothing else.”
“And you didn’t have anything to do with the pictures?”
“Other than bringing that lowlife into our circle? No, I promise.”
And I believe her.
“ OK.”
“I’m sorry, Cadence.”
“I believe you, Hailey. I accept your apology. I’m sorry it came to this.”
“What’s going to happen between you and Sebastian?” She asks after a few minutes of silence, as we all are lost in our thoughts.
“What do you mean? Nothing.”
“This doesn’t change anything?” Her question mirrors the one I’ve been asking myself.
“I don’t know.”
“He wasn’t choosing between us, Cadence. He was choosing between keeping his word to me or not, and if you know anything about Seb, it’s that he’ll never break a promise to you.”
“I think I know that much.”
“And one more thing. It’s that if you don’t come back, he’s never, ever going to be the same.”
“Does he know you’re here?”
“No. I’ve only just come from telling the guys what happened. They’re not that happy with me either right now, for introducing Gemma to them. But well... Jez asked me to give you this.” She holds out a small CD envelope to me.
I reach for it slowly, “What is it?”
“It’s a recording of something he found on the computer. He thinks it’s probably important you hear it.”
SEBASTIAN
“So, what do you think?” Jez asks me once it’s just to two of us left in the room. It’s been a long day, and I just want some quiet time to myself.
“About what?”
“What Hailey told us.”
“What is there to think? It happened, and now we know why. Dennis will do what he does.” Though whatever that is, it’ll only fix part of the problem. The rest is beyond fixing at this point.
“I mean about Cadence, what is this going to mean about you two?”
“Nothing. She already decided she wants nothing to do with me, what more can I do?” I try to answer him flippantly. I’m afraid of another shower intervention, if the boys catch me moping over my broken heart again.
“You could not be more of a chickenshit.” Jez says to me, shaking his head.
“Hey.”
“Seriously, man, where are your balls?”
“She doesn’t want to see me. She hates me! She thinks it’s me that did this to her and she blames Hailey, and in a way she isn’t wrong, even if it’s not exactly how she thinks. What more can I do?”
“You make her realize that you’re worth it, dude.”
“I don’t know if I can do that. Because I don’t know that I DO deserve her.”
“Well, duh! We all know you don’t! But for some reason she’s cockmad for you! Don’t take that for granted.”
I get up and wander over to the piano. Running my fingers over the keys, remembering the way she sat here, lost in the music, me watching her, mesmerized by her.
“What if I told you Hailey was over there explaining everything right now?” Jez breaks my daydream. “What if right now, Hailey was getting you off the hook?”
“I- I don’t know! Does that change anything?”
“Goddammit, do I have to do EVERYTHING for you? DO you LOVE her, man?!”
“You know I do!”
“Then for fucking sakes, use those balls for something other than a toy to fiddle with when you’re bored and go get your woman back!!”
CADENCE
I’ve waited as long as I can.
Waited until Hailey left and convinced Sarah to go home.
Waited until I took a shower and stood in the kitchen making tea and waiting for it to cool.
Waited until the sun had set and the stars had come out to play.
Waited until I could barely breathe from the weight of the suspense.
And now I’m ready.
I slide the CD into my laptop and click on the one file.
There’s a soft buzz and then the sound of soft breathing in the microphone.
And then he speaks. “This is... this is “Cadence’s Song”. A song for my muse. My everything, my here, there, everywhere and in between. I miss you so much. This is for you. ”
My heart feels like it skips one, two, three beats and I thump myself on the chest to start it. The tears have already started to fill my eyes and I feel my fingers grip into fists, almost like I’m trying to capture the air particles that carry the timbres of his voice. How I’ve missed his voice. His words, his whispers into my shoulder as he cradles me from behind.
And then he starts to play.
It’s a sweet, beautiful melody. Gentle and lilting, the sound of moonlight on water, of raindrops on skin. Parts of it sound so familiar, and I remember I’ve heard some of it before, heard it that night after the club incident.
It’s him. It’s all him. It’s as though he’s speaking to me, clearer than if he’d used words.
The song is heartbreaking, his notes long and sad, dark and yearning. It’s like he’s been watching me these last few days and turned my tears into music.
I feel so alone and yet so understood all at once.
I can’t help but ponder what I’ve lost and what I may never find again. I’m not the same person I was when I was seventeen and shut my heart off to the world. Maybe this time, my response to the brutal invasion of my privacy should have been different. I tried exclusion, maybe this time I should’ve tried inclusion. Instead of hiding, I should’ve sought justice and strength in facing it together and publicly declaring, ‘this is not acceptable’.
But it’s too late. I cast the die in pain and fear.
The music ends on a tender, minor chord, the mournful sound of endings, and it fills my heart with an ache in the shape of him.