A Filthy Christmas (Filthy Line #6) - Jaxson Kidman Page 0,4

told myself not to call him back.

Do not call him back.

There was zero need to talk to Blaze ever again.

Every time he got drunk and started to sober up, he would call me. And I was always dumb enough to answer and get excited. A part of my heart still had us as teenagers, writing and playing music, picturing our lives together.

That was dead and gone.

I had to move on.

And I did.

I had been singing in a few groups just to pass time and make contacts.

Now I was booking studio time left and right.

I had an offer to go solo but turned it down when I heard the music. I was not going to be some fake blonde-haired woman with crotchless pants on, singing to overdubbed beats about some asshole guy.

I would much rather write that song myself with a guitar and some raw vocals.

That was all in time.

One step at a time.

Life for me now was about going slow.

The best I could.

Slow was not calling Blaze back.

Slow was going back into the studio to finish my work for the day.

I opened the door and rolled my eyes.

Shane.

Whoever the hell that was.

I went into the building and back to the studio.

Working with Filthy Line was kind of a dream come true thing. Anyone they worked with seemed to become famous. They were working on a few songs with a bigger sound. Something that made the band argue a lot. A lot of the time I just stood in the vocal booth as Nash and Dex argued over the way the song sounded. I had to record the same vocals about thirty times. Which was fine. I was able to showcase what I could do with my voice.

I kind of got to know Reed’s girlfriend - Abby - because she sang with the band a long time ago.

Her voice was unbelievable.

She met me in the hallway and shook her head. “Shit show in there, girlfriend.”

“That’s fine,” I said. “I’m getting paid.”

“Good answer,” she said. She lifted her hand and we slapped five. “Hey… can you play guitar?”

“Of course I can. One good thing I learned from my ex.”

“Tell me you stole his favorite guitar,” Abby said.

“I wish,” I said. “I just had to get out of there. I was lucky to get my clothes.”

“Damn. That bad?”

“When you find out he was fucking a lot of women for a long time…”

Abby nodded. “That’s the life around here. The reason why I was asking about the guitar… come with me.”

Abby grabbed my hand.

We went into the studio.

Dex walked by me with a head nod, looking pissed off.

His left hand was still in a black cast.

I wasn’t completely sure what happened to Dex, but I knew his hand was broken and that meant no playing guitar. And that meant he was pissed all the time over it.

“What happened to Dex’s hand?” I asked Abby.

He looked back at me and smiled. “You don’t want to know.”

Abby handed me the flask and nodded. “Have a drink. It’s okay. I won’t tell.”

“No offense, but I’m not sleeping with a rich rock star. I need a job.”

“You’re not going to lose your job, Lita,” Abby said. “I promise. You’re done for today. They’re arguing over the guitar parts now. Dex hates that Jay is playing it the way he does. Jay wants to bring in another guitarist. Dex is mad… blah, blah, blah…”

“Okay,” I said.

I took a drink from the flask.

Ten minutes later, we had gone through half the flask.

We sat on the floor in the vocal booth, on a plushy, purplish carpet.

We each had a guitar and we were just strumming away.

Drinking. Laughing. Having fun.

It seemed weird that this was my reality, but I knew it was a temporary reality.

Later today Abby would go home to her mansion in the hills with Reed and I would go back to my noisy apartment.

“We should do a Christmas song,” Abby said.

I laughed. “Yeah, right. Acoustic rock Christmas?”

“Two bad ass chicks like us, why not?” Abby asked.

“I’m good.”

“What does that mean? You don’t believe in Santa?”

“Have you ever done Christmas where it was cold and snowy?” I asked.

“Oh, yeah, plenty of times,” Abby said. “Have you?”

“No,” I said. “I’ve always lived around here. It’s always sunny and warm.”

“You need a cold Christmas in your life then,” she said. “It makes everything better. We grew up seeing Santa, snow and all that…”

“Which is all bullshit anyway.”

“Come on, Lita, play into it a little,” Abby said.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll play into it.