“Wow…” Aurelia’s gaze is unimpressed as she cocks her head to study me. “You’re kind of mean when you’re not trembling like a baby deer in my presence.” I feel my cheeks warm as I scratch my nape. I’m about to apologize when she suddenly smiles. It’s…radiant. “Keep it up, Cura. I have a feeling we’re finally getting to the real you. So what about rap?” she asks, returning to the original thread of our conversation.
I wave my hand to indicate sometimes. Rap was Seth’s thing. “Wait, you rap too? He didn’t mention that.”
“No.” “I’ve only done a few features. It started with me providing backup vocals. There wasn’t much notoriety or credit in it, but as my name grew, that changed to me singing the hooks and choruses.”
“Which song was your favorite?” I hear myself ask before I even know the question is there in my mind.
“‘I Know You Do,’” she states without hesitation. “It was one of the few projects I got to choose for myself. Before I becameAurelia.”
“Is Aurelia a stage name?”
“No. It’s the name my parents gave me. But it meant something different once stardom came. After that, I wastheAurelia to everyone and never just Aurelia to anyone.”
“And that bothered you? Don’t most people in your business want that?”
“Sure. At first. Until you realize you’ve never known true isolation until your face and name are known by everyone. I was constantlyonall the time, guarding my feelings and measuring my words, knowing they’ll be picked apart for entertainment between albums. There was no room for me in my life anymore. I was a celebrity all the time, even if I was just having breakfast.”
“Sounds…” I grapple for a word. “Constricting.”
“Some days it was unbearable. Others, it was just part of the job.”
I consider everything Aurelia said and all the things she didn’t before asking, “I take it something happened that you regret?”
“What I did to Tania was wrong,” she says without context. I’m guessing it’s a story I’ve heard before. It’s one of the few times Aurelia slips up and forgets that I’m not Seth, so I don’t fault her for it. I just listen. “I know that now, but what’s the point of feeling remorse if no one gives a shit?”
“The point isn’t that you regret your mistakes but that you learn from them. The only person who can offer you true absolution is yourself. Desiring more than that is a performance. It’s theater, and people want to be entertained. Forgiving you just means the show ends. It seems cruel because it is, but don’t you see the hypocrisy? You resent not being treated as a human being while begrudging others their human nature, just as they judge you for your public wrongs while burying the things they do in the dark.”
“So you’re saying we’re all just hypocrites and it’s hopeless?”
“There’s always hope, princess.”
The rest of the walk is made in reflective silence until our clearing comes into view, but I can’t let it end there. “I’m sorry,” I offer, wondering if my words had only done more harm than good to her. “I shouldn’t have said—”
“No. I…” She sighs. “I needed to hear it. Thank you, Ezekiel.”
“Zeke,” I softly remind her. “Just Zeke.” Aurelia gives me an inquisitive look. “You aren’t the only one who feels as if their identity was stolen from them,” I whisper. After another pause, I add, “My brother called me Ezekiel. He preferred formality when it suited him.”
Tatum preferred my proper name too.
It literallyhurtsto hear Aurelia say my name, but sometimes, it feels healing too. Like the pain that briefly comes when you reset a broken bone or the stabbing, burning feeling of having your flesh sown back together.
Each time I feel myself being pulled into her orbit, I run screaming in the opposite direction.
But not this time.
Aurelia’s the sun, a flaming star, and all I want to do is revolve around her, but I know that if I get too close, I’ll burn.
Is that why Seth calls her Sunshine? Did he feel it too? Obviously, he hadn’t wasted any time resisting her lure, but Seth is green. Like Icarus he ignored the warnings because he doesn’t know how it feels to have your heart torn out of your chest and shredded by the only person you trusted it with.
Or maybe he does.
I know Seth is still there, but he won’t let me feel him. He won’t talk to me either. Khalil and Thorin said that Seth and Aurelia were alone at the time of the attack. What if he didn’t tell them everything? What if she’s hiding something?
Aurelia sighs, but the sound isn’t quite right. It sounds more like a shudder, like someone shedding a paroxysm of pain or fighting the urge to cry. It’s something she has a habit of doing whenever I’m around. Begrudgingly, I can admit that it’s one of the reasons I stay away. I know my presence is only causing her anguish. But then she asked me—no,daredme to stop running and for some fucking reason, I didn’t want to disappoint.
“You okay?”
“What?” Like a startled doe, her head swings toward me, and her red eyes are glistening and wide, but no tears have fallen. Her light brown skin is flushed, and she looks moments from shattering. She’s beautiful. “Yeah, I’m-I’m fine. I think I’m allergic to the pollen.”
