Legendary
Chapter Five.
At 12:32, Pete called.
He called again at 12:46 and at 12:57. At 1:12 he left a voicemail asking if I’d like to meet up for dinner because he’d like to apologize for not calling until three days after the press conference. Ten minutes later, he left another voicemail saying he reserved my favorite restaurant for dinner tonight at 6:00, saying I could show up if I wanted to.
None of these I responded to.
At 6:53, he sent me a text: “im sorry. for everything. i miss you.” Not even a minute later, he sent another:
“so much.”
---
“Hey, you’ve been quiet today,” Rachel asked that night, coming in the bedroom. I shrugged and she walked around the suitcase and over to the bed. “What’s bugging you?”
I licked my lips, weighing the pros and cons of telling her. “Pete’s been trying to get a hold of me.”
“Why don’t you just talk to him? I mean, he’s gotta be feeling pretty bad.”
Sighing, I shifted on the bed, making a little bit of room for her. She instantly moved onto it, crossing her legs and sitting Indian-style, eyes trained on mine.
“It’s more than that, Rach; he really messed up things…” I trailed off, not even sure what I was trying to say. “Just let me be pissed at him, okay?”
Her hand gently reached over and twirled a piece of my hair between her fingers as she spoke. “Don’t get snippy with me, now. I know it’s not what you wanna hear, but I can’t help that. You seriously are going to have to get over this, okay?”
I brushed her hand away, threw my shoulders in a half-assed shrug, and looked down, picking at my thumbnail to avoid her glare.
“Okay, fine,” I felt her side of the bed shift, assuming she got up. “I didn’t mean to disturb your PMS-ing, continue on without me.”
I heard the door shut – not slam – so that meant she’d be back, and that she wasn’t too pissed. A few minutes passed, and I just sat there, followed the pattern on the sheets with my finger before finding the room was too quiet and trailing off after Rachel.
She was downstairs, sitting at the table with my mom and Megan, talking over a cup of coffee. Taking a stance behind her, I let my hand travel across her back, one shoulder to the other.
“So, it’s been a long day, I think I’m heading to bed,” my mom smiled at me, placing a kiss on my cheek before heading upstairs where Chandler soon followed her.
Megan took another drink of her coffee, placing it back on the table gently. “So,” she started, as if trying to break the silence, “how long have you two been dating?”
This brought a smile to Rachel’s face and I could detect a hint of color surface to her cheeks. “Almost a year and a half, right?” She glanced up at me and I nodded, tracing my name into the skin of her neck with my index, rewarded when she shivered almost motionlessly.
Laying her head in her hands, Megan smiled. “Sorry about today. You can just ignore Kevin.” She snorted. “He means well, he just…” she paused, chewing her bottom lip, “doesn’t know when to stop.”
“Obviously,” I retorted, harsher than meant, but I didn’t take it back either. A day of constant ridicule does that to a person.
“Oh, come on. He’s your brother,” Megan shrugged, “it’s his job.”
My hand found its way over to Rachel’s shoulder and my other reached around, stealing the coffee from her grip. “It’s his job to support me, no matter what decisions I make. Not to continually rub in the fact that we do things normal couples do.”
Patrick, Rachel seethed immediately, her hand clasping over mine on her shoulder. She didn’t look up at me, but she squeezed my hand, which I’m pretty sure meant I better shut the fuck up.
“He does that because he looks up to you, I mean, not literally of course, but you’re a really cool guy in his eyes. Compared to him, do you know the things you’ve accomplished? He practically reeks of jealousy for you.”
I pulled my hand from under Rachel’s, taking a seat in my mom’s discarded chair. “And that’s why he feels the need to constantly put me under pressure? To… to embarrass me in front of Mom? I mean, come on, if he wants to make fun of me, fine. But putting it out there, for everyone to see? That’s just overdoing it.”
“You’re Patrick Stump: Lead singer, guitarist, sometimes-pianist of Fall Out fucking Boy. You should be used to things being ‘out there, for everyone to see.’ Pete’s pictures were pretty ‘out there’, don’t you think? And having every move you make videotaped during tour, doesn’t that count as ‘out there’?” She sighed, took another sip of coffee. “You lived in the central media of ‘out there.’ Sorry to have thought you could take some teasing. I’ll ask him to stop, okay?”
“I didn’t get a choice of things being ‘out there.’ They were because I was in a band, with a job. That was what I did. I’m sorry for thinking that I should have just quit because things weren’t perfect. You know, maybe if you stopped quitting your job whenever things didn’t go your way, you still wouldn’t be living with your parents.”
Her face went blank for a moment before she calmly stood up and walked over the basement door, only stopping when her hand landed on the door handle.
“You know?” Her voice cracked, but she still avoided looking at me. “I don’t know what happened, or when it did, but you’ve turned into a bitch. A full-on, plastic bitch. Call me when my brother’s back, we miss him.”
The door slammed shut as she disappeared down the stairs.
Rachel glowered at me, her eyes dark; so dark my stomach was twisting into a knot at the sight. “I don’t know where that came from, but I rest my case: it’s about time you fucking grew up.”
---
I scrambled over Rachel, regretting now choosing the side of the bed next to the wall, and grabbed my glasses off the nightstand before searching for my ringing phone through various jean pockets.
Fucking goddamned phone… “Hello?”
“Hey, Patrick man, I haven’t talked to you in ages. What’s up?” Travis answered, and I rolled my eyes, glancing over at the LCD clock next to the (surprisingly) sleeping Rachel.
I ran my hand through my hair and silently made my way out of the room and down the stairs. “Oh, you know, sleeping. It’s what we people do at one in the fucking morning.”
There was a silent realization on the other end. “Oh, oh dude sorry, I thought you were in LA still.” I shook my head, ignoring the fact he couldn’t see me. “Well, do you have a minute? I’ve got a big question to ask.”
“No, dude, I just jumped out of bed and grabbed the phone so I could tell you to wait until later.” I shuffled through the fridge, determined to find a late night snack, huffing when I came up unsuccessful.
He snorted. “Of course, but, hey, from the bottom of our little Gym Class Hero hearts, we were wondering if you wanted to produce our next record.”
Hand glued to the fridge, eyes growing wide, I froze. Things had been shit lately, and… this was my break and, suddenly, whether I believed he was there or not, I was silently praising God’s royal ass.
“Hey, little dude, you there?”
My head began shaking without my say-so and I held the phone as tight as I could to my ear. “Oh my god, yes, I would love to. This is, wow, thank you.” Every word jumbled into each other and even I could barely understand what I was saying.
“It’s no problem; you know we always love having you in the studio with us.” A smile made its way to my lips as he continued to talk. “So, we sent a few demos and couple beats and lyrics to your email. Feel free to look at them and, you know, tell us they’re shit and when you come home you can fix our awful mistakes and help us make beautiful music, sound good?”
I was still far too excited to be able to form a real sentence, or one that made sense. Instead I just thanked him another fucking bajillion times and dashed up the stairs and into the bedroom, shutting the door before reaching the bed in two giant steps.
“Rachel,” I whispered, carefully hovering over her. “Rachel, guess what.” I placed a kiss to her jaw and she stirred slightly, still staying sound asleep though. “Rachel, love, you won’t believe this.” Another series of light kisses from her neck up to her cheek, then nose, then lips, and her eyes fluttered open, confusion washing over her face.
“Patrick? Seriously?” She glanced over to the clock. “One,” she blinked, “in the morning. What the fuck could you want?”
Any other day, I’d be offended, instead, I just giggled, placing another kiss to her lips.
“Travis called,” I murmured, “wants me to produce their next album.”
Whatever the hell anger had been there sort of vanished and a smile spread across her lips. “That’s great, sweetie, really.” She leaned up, placing a kiss on my cheek. “Get some sleep though, okay? You’ve got things to fix tomorrow.”
I grimaced and laid back down next to her, face to face, reaching my arms around her waist and pulling her close. Her head burrowed into shoulder and she was out in no time. I smiled against her hair, placing one last kiss on it before joining her.
---
First thing in the morning, I had my laptop out and email up, downloading anything and everything they had sent. I dug out some headphones from the bottom of the suitcase and stole some paper and a pen from downstairs and was already scribbling suggestions, critiques, anything before Rachel was even awake.
When I glanced over, she was propped up on her elbows on the bed, hair tossed around in a mess, falling around her face and off her shoulders. The bed sheets pulled around her waist, wrinkled and muddled, matching her hair. A smirk pulled across her lips as our eyes met, and she scrunched her nose up in a half smile.
“Morning, sunshine.” I pulled my headphones down so they hung around my neck. “Sleep well?”
“Pretty well, except for” –she shrugged– “you know, being woken up in the middle of the night.” She swung her head around, gathering her hair in her hands. “You’re already working on it?”
“Mhmm, they sent me some stuff so I figured, why not?”
Her feet padded across the room and she placed a kiss on my cheek. “Maybe because we’re on vacation? C’mon, I left work behind for this, can’t you too?”
I shook my head, pulling my headphones back up. “I won’t spend too much time on it, I promise.” As soon as she left the room, I pulled my iTunes up and went back to work.
God knows how much later, Rachel came in, without saying a word, took my computer and paused the music. I looked up at her quizzically and she gently pulled my headphones off.
“Alright, you’ve been in here enough. Let’s go grab some lunch with your dad. We haven’t seen him since we’ve been here.”
Immediately, I started shaking my head and opened my mouth to object.
“It’s not your choice, I already told him we were coming.” She took my hands in hers, pulling me up and out of the chair. “Plus, Megan’s still moping. I told her you were sorry and you were having a bad day, but that’s not fixing anything. You’ve got to make things okay.”
“Rachel…” I felt almost like a three-year-old whining like that, but I wanted to get this done, I wanted to get these songs to a point where we could just start the producing process as soon as I got home.
Her eyes locked on mine. “We came here for you. We came here to help you get back on your feet. Until we go home, this is all about you. Unless we’re leaving right now, you are going to go downstairs and talk to Megan and give her a hug, and then we are going to lunch. Got it?”
I nodded this time and she pecked a small kiss to my lips. “Thank you,” she whispered and disappeared out the door as I got ready, pulling on the jeans she gave me, a t-shirt, and my jean jacket before descending the stairs.
Megan was sitting on the couch in the living room, knees to her chest, head thrown back against the leather. Rachel shot me pleading eyes before leaving the room, motioning my mom to follow her so it was just Megan and me.
“Hey, Meg,” I greeted quietly, taking a seat next to her. She looked over at me, enough to show she acknowledged my presence. “So, how much do you hate me?”
Silence.
“I love you to death; you know I didn’t mean it. I was just… you know, it was a bad day.”
She snorted.
“And I definitely shouldn’t have taken it out on you. It was a mistake, and I wish you’d talk to me.”
She shook her head, her voice coming out soft and low, “What do you even want me to say?”
Honesty is the best policy. “I have no clue.”
“Exactly.”
She stood up and all but stomped out, grabbing her keys off the counter and starting for the garage. I jumped up behind her and followed, placing a hand on her shoulder. “Megan, listen to me, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have-“
She shoved my hand off and disappeared into the garage, slamming the door on her way out. I waited for a moment, deciding whether I should follow her or not, though, I decided against it and turned around to find Rachel looking up at me, waiting.
“I swear to god, I tried, she-“
Her arms came around my neck and, hell, I nestled into her neck, letting out a deep breath against her skin. I knew I had messed up, big time, but this was torture. And I knew it was probably going to get way worse before it got better.
Rachel ran her hand through my hair, twisting her head slightly to place kiss on my jaw. “It’s okay,” she whispered, “let’s just go get some lunch.”
---
“You know, this is a perfect I-told-you-so moment.”
My dad took another bite of his Panini, still shaking his head shamefully at me. In his eyes, this whole band aspiration was pointless. He had wanted me to be a “real musician,” as he had called it, and gone solo.
“That Wentz kid, I could see he was in it just for himself. You think he really ever cared what happened with you guys?”
I waved him off, pushing my sad excuse for a sandwich around my plate. “It wasn’t just Pete; Joe and Andy were ready to call it off too. You can’t blame just him.”
Rachel looked up instantaneously for the first time that meal, eyebrows raised, a slight smile faint on her lips; almost her way of telling me to take my own advice. She bit back a smile and I just shrugged her off, looking back over at my dad.
“And you think they cared about you too?” I gave him a sharp nod and he huffed. “Of course not. Why should they? They wanted you around to sing and play guitar and, when all is said and done, what were you to them? Nothing.”
He jumped back when I slammed my hand down onto the table, Rachel looking up at me through her eyelashes. “You don’t know anything about them. They mean more to me than life itself; you have no right to say anything about them.” I stood up, pulling my wallet out of my pocket and throwing some cash on the table and motioned Rachel to follow me.
“Where are you going?” she asked under her breath, voice rigid and sharp. I waved at her again, and she stood up carefully, looking between my dad and me.
“Home.” I spat. “We’re going home.”
He called again at 12:46 and at 12:57. At 1:12 he left a voicemail asking if I’d like to meet up for dinner because he’d like to apologize for not calling until three days after the press conference. Ten minutes later, he left another voicemail saying he reserved my favorite restaurant for dinner tonight at 6:00, saying I could show up if I wanted to.
None of these I responded to.
At 6:53, he sent me a text: “im sorry. for everything. i miss you.” Not even a minute later, he sent another:
“so much.”
---
“Hey, you’ve been quiet today,” Rachel asked that night, coming in the bedroom. I shrugged and she walked around the suitcase and over to the bed. “What’s bugging you?”
I licked my lips, weighing the pros and cons of telling her. “Pete’s been trying to get a hold of me.”
“Why don’t you just talk to him? I mean, he’s gotta be feeling pretty bad.”
Sighing, I shifted on the bed, making a little bit of room for her. She instantly moved onto it, crossing her legs and sitting Indian-style, eyes trained on mine.
“It’s more than that, Rach; he really messed up things…” I trailed off, not even sure what I was trying to say. “Just let me be pissed at him, okay?”
Her hand gently reached over and twirled a piece of my hair between her fingers as she spoke. “Don’t get snippy with me, now. I know it’s not what you wanna hear, but I can’t help that. You seriously are going to have to get over this, okay?”
I brushed her hand away, threw my shoulders in a half-assed shrug, and looked down, picking at my thumbnail to avoid her glare.
“Okay, fine,” I felt her side of the bed shift, assuming she got up. “I didn’t mean to disturb your PMS-ing, continue on without me.”
I heard the door shut – not slam – so that meant she’d be back, and that she wasn’t too pissed. A few minutes passed, and I just sat there, followed the pattern on the sheets with my finger before finding the room was too quiet and trailing off after Rachel.
She was downstairs, sitting at the table with my mom and Megan, talking over a cup of coffee. Taking a stance behind her, I let my hand travel across her back, one shoulder to the other.
“So, it’s been a long day, I think I’m heading to bed,” my mom smiled at me, placing a kiss on my cheek before heading upstairs where Chandler soon followed her.
Megan took another drink of her coffee, placing it back on the table gently. “So,” she started, as if trying to break the silence, “how long have you two been dating?”
This brought a smile to Rachel’s face and I could detect a hint of color surface to her cheeks. “Almost a year and a half, right?” She glanced up at me and I nodded, tracing my name into the skin of her neck with my index, rewarded when she shivered almost motionlessly.
Laying her head in her hands, Megan smiled. “Sorry about today. You can just ignore Kevin.” She snorted. “He means well, he just…” she paused, chewing her bottom lip, “doesn’t know when to stop.”
“Obviously,” I retorted, harsher than meant, but I didn’t take it back either. A day of constant ridicule does that to a person.
“Oh, come on. He’s your brother,” Megan shrugged, “it’s his job.”
My hand found its way over to Rachel’s shoulder and my other reached around, stealing the coffee from her grip. “It’s his job to support me, no matter what decisions I make. Not to continually rub in the fact that we do things normal couples do.”
Patrick, Rachel seethed immediately, her hand clasping over mine on her shoulder. She didn’t look up at me, but she squeezed my hand, which I’m pretty sure meant I better shut the fuck up.
“He does that because he looks up to you, I mean, not literally of course, but you’re a really cool guy in his eyes. Compared to him, do you know the things you’ve accomplished? He practically reeks of jealousy for you.”
I pulled my hand from under Rachel’s, taking a seat in my mom’s discarded chair. “And that’s why he feels the need to constantly put me under pressure? To… to embarrass me in front of Mom? I mean, come on, if he wants to make fun of me, fine. But putting it out there, for everyone to see? That’s just overdoing it.”
“You’re Patrick Stump: Lead singer, guitarist, sometimes-pianist of Fall Out fucking Boy. You should be used to things being ‘out there, for everyone to see.’ Pete’s pictures were pretty ‘out there’, don’t you think? And having every move you make videotaped during tour, doesn’t that count as ‘out there’?” She sighed, took another sip of coffee. “You lived in the central media of ‘out there.’ Sorry to have thought you could take some teasing. I’ll ask him to stop, okay?”
“I didn’t get a choice of things being ‘out there.’ They were because I was in a band, with a job. That was what I did. I’m sorry for thinking that I should have just quit because things weren’t perfect. You know, maybe if you stopped quitting your job whenever things didn’t go your way, you still wouldn’t be living with your parents.”
Her face went blank for a moment before she calmly stood up and walked over the basement door, only stopping when her hand landed on the door handle.
“You know?” Her voice cracked, but she still avoided looking at me. “I don’t know what happened, or when it did, but you’ve turned into a bitch. A full-on, plastic bitch. Call me when my brother’s back, we miss him.”
The door slammed shut as she disappeared down the stairs.
Rachel glowered at me, her eyes dark; so dark my stomach was twisting into a knot at the sight. “I don’t know where that came from, but I rest my case: it’s about time you fucking grew up.”
---
I scrambled over Rachel, regretting now choosing the side of the bed next to the wall, and grabbed my glasses off the nightstand before searching for my ringing phone through various jean pockets.
Fucking goddamned phone… “Hello?”
“Hey, Patrick man, I haven’t talked to you in ages. What’s up?” Travis answered, and I rolled my eyes, glancing over at the LCD clock next to the (surprisingly) sleeping Rachel.
I ran my hand through my hair and silently made my way out of the room and down the stairs. “Oh, you know, sleeping. It’s what we people do at one in the fucking morning.”
There was a silent realization on the other end. “Oh, oh dude sorry, I thought you were in LA still.” I shook my head, ignoring the fact he couldn’t see me. “Well, do you have a minute? I’ve got a big question to ask.”
“No, dude, I just jumped out of bed and grabbed the phone so I could tell you to wait until later.” I shuffled through the fridge, determined to find a late night snack, huffing when I came up unsuccessful.
He snorted. “Of course, but, hey, from the bottom of our little Gym Class Hero hearts, we were wondering if you wanted to produce our next record.”
Hand glued to the fridge, eyes growing wide, I froze. Things had been shit lately, and… this was my break and, suddenly, whether I believed he was there or not, I was silently praising God’s royal ass.
“Hey, little dude, you there?”
My head began shaking without my say-so and I held the phone as tight as I could to my ear. “Oh my god, yes, I would love to. This is, wow, thank you.” Every word jumbled into each other and even I could barely understand what I was saying.
“It’s no problem; you know we always love having you in the studio with us.” A smile made its way to my lips as he continued to talk. “So, we sent a few demos and couple beats and lyrics to your email. Feel free to look at them and, you know, tell us they’re shit and when you come home you can fix our awful mistakes and help us make beautiful music, sound good?”
I was still far too excited to be able to form a real sentence, or one that made sense. Instead I just thanked him another fucking bajillion times and dashed up the stairs and into the bedroom, shutting the door before reaching the bed in two giant steps.
“Rachel,” I whispered, carefully hovering over her. “Rachel, guess what.” I placed a kiss to her jaw and she stirred slightly, still staying sound asleep though. “Rachel, love, you won’t believe this.” Another series of light kisses from her neck up to her cheek, then nose, then lips, and her eyes fluttered open, confusion washing over her face.
“Patrick? Seriously?” She glanced over to the clock. “One,” she blinked, “in the morning. What the fuck could you want?”
Any other day, I’d be offended, instead, I just giggled, placing another kiss to her lips.
“Travis called,” I murmured, “wants me to produce their next album.”
Whatever the hell anger had been there sort of vanished and a smile spread across her lips. “That’s great, sweetie, really.” She leaned up, placing a kiss on my cheek. “Get some sleep though, okay? You’ve got things to fix tomorrow.”
I grimaced and laid back down next to her, face to face, reaching my arms around her waist and pulling her close. Her head burrowed into shoulder and she was out in no time. I smiled against her hair, placing one last kiss on it before joining her.
---
First thing in the morning, I had my laptop out and email up, downloading anything and everything they had sent. I dug out some headphones from the bottom of the suitcase and stole some paper and a pen from downstairs and was already scribbling suggestions, critiques, anything before Rachel was even awake.
When I glanced over, she was propped up on her elbows on the bed, hair tossed around in a mess, falling around her face and off her shoulders. The bed sheets pulled around her waist, wrinkled and muddled, matching her hair. A smirk pulled across her lips as our eyes met, and she scrunched her nose up in a half smile.
“Morning, sunshine.” I pulled my headphones down so they hung around my neck. “Sleep well?”
“Pretty well, except for” –she shrugged– “you know, being woken up in the middle of the night.” She swung her head around, gathering her hair in her hands. “You’re already working on it?”
“Mhmm, they sent me some stuff so I figured, why not?”
Her feet padded across the room and she placed a kiss on my cheek. “Maybe because we’re on vacation? C’mon, I left work behind for this, can’t you too?”
I shook my head, pulling my headphones back up. “I won’t spend too much time on it, I promise.” As soon as she left the room, I pulled my iTunes up and went back to work.
God knows how much later, Rachel came in, without saying a word, took my computer and paused the music. I looked up at her quizzically and she gently pulled my headphones off.
“Alright, you’ve been in here enough. Let’s go grab some lunch with your dad. We haven’t seen him since we’ve been here.”
Immediately, I started shaking my head and opened my mouth to object.
“It’s not your choice, I already told him we were coming.” She took my hands in hers, pulling me up and out of the chair. “Plus, Megan’s still moping. I told her you were sorry and you were having a bad day, but that’s not fixing anything. You’ve got to make things okay.”
“Rachel…” I felt almost like a three-year-old whining like that, but I wanted to get this done, I wanted to get these songs to a point where we could just start the producing process as soon as I got home.
Her eyes locked on mine. “We came here for you. We came here to help you get back on your feet. Until we go home, this is all about you. Unless we’re leaving right now, you are going to go downstairs and talk to Megan and give her a hug, and then we are going to lunch. Got it?”
I nodded this time and she pecked a small kiss to my lips. “Thank you,” she whispered and disappeared out the door as I got ready, pulling on the jeans she gave me, a t-shirt, and my jean jacket before descending the stairs.
Megan was sitting on the couch in the living room, knees to her chest, head thrown back against the leather. Rachel shot me pleading eyes before leaving the room, motioning my mom to follow her so it was just Megan and me.
“Hey, Meg,” I greeted quietly, taking a seat next to her. She looked over at me, enough to show she acknowledged my presence. “So, how much do you hate me?”
Silence.
“I love you to death; you know I didn’t mean it. I was just… you know, it was a bad day.”
She snorted.
“And I definitely shouldn’t have taken it out on you. It was a mistake, and I wish you’d talk to me.”
She shook her head, her voice coming out soft and low, “What do you even want me to say?”
Honesty is the best policy. “I have no clue.”
“Exactly.”
She stood up and all but stomped out, grabbing her keys off the counter and starting for the garage. I jumped up behind her and followed, placing a hand on her shoulder. “Megan, listen to me, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have-“
She shoved my hand off and disappeared into the garage, slamming the door on her way out. I waited for a moment, deciding whether I should follow her or not, though, I decided against it and turned around to find Rachel looking up at me, waiting.
“I swear to god, I tried, she-“
Her arms came around my neck and, hell, I nestled into her neck, letting out a deep breath against her skin. I knew I had messed up, big time, but this was torture. And I knew it was probably going to get way worse before it got better.
Rachel ran her hand through my hair, twisting her head slightly to place kiss on my jaw. “It’s okay,” she whispered, “let’s just go get some lunch.”
---
“You know, this is a perfect I-told-you-so moment.”
My dad took another bite of his Panini, still shaking his head shamefully at me. In his eyes, this whole band aspiration was pointless. He had wanted me to be a “real musician,” as he had called it, and gone solo.
“That Wentz kid, I could see he was in it just for himself. You think he really ever cared what happened with you guys?”
I waved him off, pushing my sad excuse for a sandwich around my plate. “It wasn’t just Pete; Joe and Andy were ready to call it off too. You can’t blame just him.”
Rachel looked up instantaneously for the first time that meal, eyebrows raised, a slight smile faint on her lips; almost her way of telling me to take my own advice. She bit back a smile and I just shrugged her off, looking back over at my dad.
“And you think they cared about you too?” I gave him a sharp nod and he huffed. “Of course not. Why should they? They wanted you around to sing and play guitar and, when all is said and done, what were you to them? Nothing.”
He jumped back when I slammed my hand down onto the table, Rachel looking up at me through her eyelashes. “You don’t know anything about them. They mean more to me than life itself; you have no right to say anything about them.” I stood up, pulling my wallet out of my pocket and throwing some cash on the table and motioned Rachel to follow me.
“Where are you going?” she asked under her breath, voice rigid and sharp. I waved at her again, and she stood up carefully, looking between my dad and me.
“Home.” I spat. “We’re going home.”