Super Fake Love Song - David Yoon Page 0,80

said Gray.

“No I won’t,” I said, and kicked a rattling fence.

“This too shall pass,” said Gray.

“I hate you,” I said.

“I hate me too,” said Gray.

“This isn’t about you,” I said.

“You have no idea,” said Gray, which might’ve made some kind of sense in his drunken mind but to me sounded infuriatingly nonsensical.

Gray teetered back to his feet and stood. I suddenly wanted to fight him. I of course had no idea how to fight—all I knew was fire attacks and sword slashes and magic missiles, all fake as hell—and only managed a pathetic shove with both hands, easily batted aside.

“Cut it out,” said Gray.

“I used to think you were cool,” I said, as the sky around us turned dark green. “You’re not cool. You’re a loser.”

Gray simply acknowledged my words. He scowled at the city glittering below us. “I wasted three years of my life in this dump. Do you know I was scheduled to pitch one of the biggest A&R execs in LA, and I stood her up because I overslept? That was it. I was done.”

Dr-room-dum-dum-dum!

I could only stare at him. He had just crashed my show, and now he was throwing himself a pity party?

“All I had to do was let you make it through tonight,” said Gray. “And I screwed that up, too.”

He chuffed to himself. Chuffed!

“I’m going,” I said. “Feel free to hang out on this amazing sidewalk for all eternity.”

Gray threw me a testy look. “You’ll get her back, god! Or you won’t, and you’ll be fine! So many second chances out there, you don’t even know. It’s not like it’s the music industry. This is nothing, trust me.”

Something about the words trust me made me stop. When Paladin Gray had gotten erased down to nothing, the real Gray had not come to my defense. The real Gray was already long gone.

When I shoved him this time, Gray was unprepared. I tripped over a pipe jutting from the concrete; Gray hit the ground backward.

I caught my balance just in time to see Gray do a rolling tumble into the rightmost lane of the rushing river of white and red lights that was Sunset Boulevard. He found his feet, looked right, and held up a polite hand as tires shrieked.

Then he was taken down.

Cool

I watched the black and white and red swirl down the drain. It took three good washings before the makeup was completely gone. Then I rinsed the sink, rinsed it again, and again, and again.

“I think it’s clean,” said a voice.

I looked up and saw Dad.

“You all right?” said Dad.

I gave a grim nod: No.

The restroom door opened, and a nurse walked in.

“They said it’s a mild concussion,” said Dad. “But they want to keep him until the hematoma goes down. Hematoma means the bump on his head.”

“That is correct,” said the nurse, before entering a stall.

Out in the hospital hallway, Dad found a carpeted bench by the vending machines and sat me down.

“You wanna talk about it?” he said.

I shook my head.

“Do you even know how to talk anymore?” said Dad, attempting humor.

“Yes,” I said.

“You know,” said Dad, “I used to look up to my older brother. Like, a lot.”

“Not like this, I bet,” I said. I squeezed my cheeks hard enough to pull my face off.

“You made a mistake,” said Dad. “But you’re gonna be okay.”

I curled a lip with resignation. I could not see how I was going to be okay.

“Let’s get you a snack,” said Dad, and began fussing with the machine.

I took out my phone and stared at its black glass. It was late. I didn’t know who to talk to. Gunner, maybe? Certainly not Milo, or Jamal, or of course Cirrus, or even Mr. Tweed. I felt like my whole world had had quite enough of me for one night. What would I even say besides? I feel terrible that I accidentally pushed my brother into oncoming traffic?

Mom appeared, motioned for Dad to go in. Only one person was allowed in the ER curtain cubicle at a time.

“How much did Gray have to drink?” said Mom. “Do you know?”

“No,” I said.

“And since when did he start drinking?” said Mom.

If you looked up from your laptop now and then, you would know.

Mom offered me a thousand-kilocalorie snack bar the size of a deck of cards—a dystopian triumph of legions of misanthropic food engineers—and I politely refused it.

“I thought I could be him,” I said. “It was such a stupid thing to think. Because even he can’t be