steal my stuff.”
“I guess you’ll go to the art supply store with me before they close and get some watercolor pencils to practice for tomorrow’s class. First we’re going to grab a salad so you can counteract that ice cream you just inhaled.”
Fiona gives me a dirty look as she crouches down to put her stuff back in the backpack. “That is not how nutrition works.”
Chapter Nineteen
Sebastian
“Quit messing up my costumes.” Monica scowls at me.
I kneel down next to the open trunk, pulling out hats and holding them up for inspection. I’m trying to find something to stuff my hair under so I can walk downtown to the general store without being recognized—and mobbed. We’re leaving tonight for a charity gig in Memphis, and I have a mental list of backup items to buy. Aspirin, underwear, socks…random things that pop into my head and nag me and won’t let go. My just-in-case shopping is a soothing ritual that I go through before every trip.
“You know I’ll put everything back neater than I found it.”
“Yes, that’s the problem. You organize my stuff and then I can’t find anything. Why does he rearrange things all the time, Parker?” Parker is sitting on the couch, guitar on his lap, absent-mindedly plucking out chords.
“Same reason he has to buy two of everything. Some kind of mental disorder, I’m assuming.” He starts singing to the tune of our latest hit. Instead of “You drive me crazy, in all the best ways,” he ad libs “He’s totally crazy, every single day.”
“I’m right here, you pair of dickwads.” I examine a baseball cap. Why does she have a Yankees baseball cap in her costume trunk? “I just want to walk to the general store without being mobbed. Is that too much to ask?” I’m not wearing a Yankees cap here in Bitter End, where people say “Damnyankees” like it’s one word.
I set the cap back in the trunk, on the left side. Hats should be arranged by size. Smallest to largest, left to right.
“For a rock star? Yes,” Monica says. She puts a cowboy hat on my head. I take it off and put it back in the trunk. To the right. “People are going to recognize you anyway.”
“Less people will recognize me. I might make it several whole blocks.”
“How long has it been now?” Monica asks me. “You and Callie dating, I mean? Three weeks?”
“Something like that.”
I’ve managed to see her at least once a day. When we’re done rehearsing, the band leaves the rehearsal studio and Callie sneaks in. We’ve also staged two very public fake dates with her in disguise as my fiancée, one in Charlotte and one in Nashville.
“I was sure you’d screw it up by now.”
“You mean you thought the press would have found us out by now?”
Russell has actually, for once, been doing a good job with our press. He’s kept the story about my “engagement” at the top of everyone’s social media feeds. Hundreds of women, some of them even semi-famous, have come forward and claimed to be my mystery fiancée. I’ve become a meme. People are photoshopping pictures of me with every celebrity they can think of. Betty White. E.T. Shamu the whale. Bigfoot.
“No, I mean I figured you guys would have split up by now. Didn’t you, Parker?”
He lifts one shoulder in a lazy shrug. “Pretty much.”
I shoot him a dirty look. “Not helping.”
“Nothing personal, you’re just lousy at relationships.” Monica grabs the cowboy hat and tries to put it on my head again. I bat it away. “This is perfect! It hides your face. Isn’t that what you want?”
I glare at her. “How is that not personal? And no, I’m not wearing a cowboy hat. Because I’m not a cowboy. I’d feel like I’m in the Village People.”
She shrugs. “Just try not to scare her away. She doesn’t annoy me like every other person you’ve ever dated.”
“And how often do you have to deal with me dating anyone? I’ve been like a monk for the past year.”
She glances over at Parker. “What do you think, Parker? Can he hold on to this one?”
“God, I hope so. He’s been so much less dickish since he started dating her.”
Dickish? “Aren’t you supposed to wait until I leave to start talking about me behind my back?” I say irritably.
“Where’s the fun in that?” Parker wrinkles his brow, giving me a puzzled look.
I find a baseball cap with no logos on it, put it on, and stuff my hair up under