“That was my big outing into the world,” I confessed. “I wanted to try on a different personality and see what happened. The two weeks felt like the perfect opportunity for it, since if I totally embarrassed myself, I wouldn’t see the majority of those people ever again.”
His lips curved up. “Sounds like a good idea. What were the results?”
“Well…” I trailed off and immediately thought of Oliver. In many ways, meeting him had derailed the entire experiment. I was so sure he’d change me into someone great, that I’d just handed him the reins. And when he was no longer there, I’d reverted right back to the old Ivy.
My fork clanked on the edge of the bowl. “Let’s just say this past Friday was the first time I’ve tried to step out of my comfort zone since. And it ended just as disastrously as the tour.” I tried to laugh off the emotion in my voice, but Jamie didn’t join in on the laughter.
He searched my face for something. “If you ever want to talk about what happened with Oli—”
“Oh, I don’t,” I cut him off, moving my gaze down to my plate. “I guess I’m starting to realize that maybe I’m not meant to be anyone different. Maybe I just need to make peace with who I am.” This was getting deep, but Jamie seemed unbothered by us wading into these waters.
“I think that’s smart. One of the lessons I’ve taken from everything that’s happened in my life is that growth starts with acceptance. You need to accept who you are—really embrace that person—before you try to make certain changes. If I’d done that back when Ritual Disruption was taking off, I may have never gotten addicted. But instead, I was so obsessed with running away from who I was, that I was willing to do stupid things and put my trust in the wrong people.”
Yeah, I knew what that was like. I still hadn’t seen Mimi since I got home after Jamie’s, but it was safe to say I wouldn’t be hanging out with her again. “Do you regret it? Becoming a musician?” I asked.
“No.” He paused to finish chewing before continuing. “I loved making music. And playing it. The first few years were pure bliss. Well, that’s not completely true. I struggled with all the attention even early on. For a while, I managed to deal with it. It just didn’t last.”
“So it was the attention that bothered you the most?”
He let out a breath. “It was a lot of things, but yeah. In the beginning, I wasn’t a confident performer, and I hated being on camera. It felt like there was this enormous spotlight on all the things I was doing wrong. I’d get full-blown panic attacks some days.”
The unexpected similarities between Jamie and I were more than a little disorienting. “I get those, too,” I confessed, buoyed by his honesty.
His eyes flashed with surprise. “Really?”
“Yeah. For me, the trigger is feeling claustrophobic when surrounded by people.” I told him the story about getting lost at the Christmas market. “Dancing together in that club was the first time I’ve felt all right doing something like that.” Heat prickled across my cheeks at the memory. I glanced away when Jamie looked at me from under his eyelashes. “I guess the MDMA helped.”
For a few minutes, we ate in silence, and I couldn’t resist stealing glances at him. The wind had ruffled his hair, and he looked a bit undone, as if he’d just gotten out of bed. What did he look like first thing in the morning? Did he sleep naked or in a pair of boxers? I was inappropriately curious about it. He definitely looked like a boxer-brief kind of guy. Actually, given his rock-star past, maybe he preferred to go without underwear…
I squeezed my thighs together again and gulped down some water.
“I never asked,” Jamie said, snapping me out of my thoughts. “What are you studying?”
“Psychology,” I said quickly.
He hiked a brow. “Sounds like an interesting major. Do you want to be a psychologist?”
I stabbed at a piece of tomato. “I’m not sure. Given my own problems, I don’t know if I can be someone who helps other people.”
He leaned slightly toward me, his arms braced on either side of his plate. “I think you absolutely can. You helped me.”
The utter confidence in his tone made me squirm in my seat. “Are you talking about the ambulance again? Honestly, it was nothing.”
Jamie shook his head. “Not only that. You saw me right away for what I was. A guy who needed help. I heard you say it in that dressing room when you argued with your brother. Then later in the stairwell. Even when you were angry, you told me the same thing. What you don’t realize is that no one on that tour saw me like that. To the rest of them, I was an asset that needed to be managed. As long as I kept performing, no one really cared what I was doing to myself.”
I frowned as my defensive walls shot up at the singer’s lie. Oliver had tried to help Jamie, I knew that for a fact.
Do you?The voice in my head was Zoey’s.That’s what he said to you, but do you have any real evidence?
Oliver had kept an eye on Jamie whenever they were in the same room together, as if it were an instinctual response. He’d worried about him. He’d taken care of him. He’d even said he’d cancel the tour if that would help Jamie. Yet when it came down to actually doing it, he hadn’t seemed too happy. Then again, who would be happy about something like that? And most importantly, why would Oliver lie to me about the dynamics between him and Jamie?
I cleared my throat. “Oliver told me he encouraged you to go to rehab.”
Jamie’s expression darkened in the blink of an eye. “Is that what he said? What else did he tell you?”
Goosebumps covered my arms as the air around us suddenly grew heavier. I stood at a crossroads. If we stayed on the subject of Oliver, I had a feeling this lunch would quickly devolve into a far-less-pleasant conversation. There was bad blood between the two men, and it would be one guy’s word against the other. Did I really want to get mixed into this? Right as I was finally trying to move on?
“You know what, let’s not talk about him,” I said, fiddling with the napkin in my lap. “It seems we get along much better when he’s not a part of our conversation.”
