My Life as a Holiday Album (My Life as an Album #5) - L.J. Evans Page 0,50

the band, forget anything but sitting in the studio, drooling as they made music.”

“She wasn’t a very good friend,” I said sourly, my heart pricking at the pain she must have felt when she realized her friend was only interested in her famous family.

She laughed bitterly.

“Don’t you get it? They were all that way. Every friend. Every boyfriend. Every person I let in. As soon as I let down the wall between them and my family, they always chose fame and fortune and my superstar relatives. Hell, even my rodeo-king cousin, Dalton, got more action out of my last boyfriend than I did.”

Pain welled up through me. Pain for her but also for me because I realized, with a sudden clarity, something I hadn’t wanted to admit before, even when it had been obvious.

“You’ve purposefully kept me away from your family…all those times…when your parents were in Knoxville…” I trailed off.

Tears continued to rain down her pale cheeks.

“Yes,” she croaked out.

I stepped away, fighting waves of emotions. It hurt that she hadn’t trusted me― us―enough to believe that I was in this for her. To somehow just know that I didn’t give a rat’s ass about her football-star brother or her rock star dad. I only cared about my beautiful Eliza. The woman who made me smile while taking a gazillion, painstaking photographs of the same scene before turning those same photos into art with an almost careless touch of her hand. The woman who argued with my mom and showed up at Black Lives Matter rallies at my side. The one who’d let my aunt teach her to crochet when staying still was one of the very last things she was good at. The woman who loved me enough to give up everything to follow me while I pursued my dream.

I was hurt and angry. But I also realized that I’d let my own built-in doubts and fears take over today. The fear that I wouldn’t be accepted. The fear that she’d be embarrassed by me. I’d assumed it was about me instead of understanding it was about her. It wasn’t healthy, either of our reactions, and the hard truth hit me. Love wouldn’t be enough if we wanted to make this work. The love had to be backed with trust and honesty.

“I’m so sorry,” she said quietly. “I…it’s unforgivable.”

I took a breath and took two steps forward, closer to her.

“Do you love me?” I asked.

“You know I do, more than anything in my life.”

“But you don’t trust me,” I said sadly.

“No. I do.”

I shook my head. “You’ve made it pretty clear you don’t.”

She tossed aside the quilt and stood up, reaching for my hands and rubbing her thumbs along the palms. “You’re right. I didn’t trust that what we have is more than what I’d ever had with anyone else. But tonight… Tonight you proved to me it is, because even when I was awful to you, you did the one thing no one else has ever done.”

I stared at her, a frown creasing my face.

“You came back for me,” she said quietly.

Goddamn. My heart ripped itself into strands of confetti. It was laying all over her room, waiting for her to pick it back up. Waiting for me to pick it back up and give it to her. My arms wrapped around her of their own accord, and she sobbed, her whole body convulsing.

“I just… I didn’t know how I’d survive if you left me for them,” she said.

“I need you to look at me,” I said, and she turned her face so I could see her eyes and she could see mine. “I’m yours. There’s no one else I want. I’m not here for them. I’ll never be here for them. I’ll always be here for you.”

I kissed her, tasting both of our tears. The salt. The hurt. I kissed her until it felt like every single fiber of me had tied a knot to every fiber in her, but then I pulled back, putting space between us again because it was hard to think when we touched. And I had to speak what I felt before I could let myself stay.

“But, ‘Z, if this is going to work, we have to be really honest with each other. We can’t hold back. We can’t let our pasts dictate our future.”

“You’re right,” she said, nodding.

“Just like that?”

“Yes. Keeping this from you…keeping my family from you…it was the hardest, stupidest thing I’ve done. I want them to know