28
For the next week I sat in my apartment moping.
I'd barely spent any time here since I first started working with Noah. We were always at his place working or having sex. For a while I only came here to sleep. Then even that changed when I started spending the night.
Natalie and Ivy were technically my roommates — they still paid rent — but they'd essentially moved in with their boyfriends and were never around. I had the entire three bedroom apartment to myself. It felt cold and lonely.
I spent most of my time thinking about what had happened with Noah. Wondering if I could have done something or said something different. But what happened had nothing to do with me and everything to do with Noah's insecurities. With his inability to open up to people. His inability to trust.
I was torn between sadness and anger. I knew Noah had his issues. Maybe I should have been more understanding. But he'd turned his back on me three times already. Once he'd thrown me out and twice he'd walked away.
When Naomi called me, I was immediately worried the new job we had been talking about had fallen through. Maybe Noah had been badmouthing me. I wouldn't have put it past him, the cranky asshole.
Instead, Naomi had a completely different reason for calling.
"Noah has been a complete basket case for the last week," she told me. "Nothing we've been saying to him works."
"What do you mean by basket case?" I asked carefully.
"He's more than his usual pissy self. He won't talk to anyone. Do you know anything about why?"
"I know he's worried about Lily…" I hedged.
"It's not just that. He's supposed to be working on arranging his song, but everything he plays is awful. He storms off whenever anyone talks to him about it. You worked with him. Do you have any ideas?"
Noah and I had been able to write that song because he'd opened up to me. Maybe he was having trouble capturing those emotions with his current mood.
"Would you mind coming in and talking to him?"
"I don't think he'll listen to me."
"It can't hurt. He's certainly not listening to anyone else."
"I'll try."
I walked into the piano room the next day with dread. To my surprise, the rest of the band members were there along with Naomi. August's mouth was twisted in a frown. One of the twins fidgeted with the thick buckles on his leather wrist cuff, looking worried. Noah wasn't there.
"Is this an intervention?" I asked.
"Of a sort," August said. "Noah's been giving us some trouble. We hoped you'd be able to get through to him."
"I don't know how much help I'll be. Noah's pretty angry at me."
"He's angry at everyone these days," said the twin who'd been fidgeting. He didn't sound sarcastic or flippant. He sounded like he was genuinely concerned. For all that they messed with each other, his bandmates did honestly care about their lead singer.
When Noah walked in, he made it two steps before stopping in his tracks.
"Why the fuck is she here?" he said, voice devoid of emotion.
"You worked with Jennifer, didn't you?" August said calmly. "She's one of our production consultants, isn't she?"
Noah crossed his arms.
"We need you to play the song again," Naomi said. "This time all of us want to hear it."
"Why?" Noah shot back.
"We just want to make sure everything's going smoothly with the songwriting process," August said. "Do us a favor and play."
