Royal Package - Lili Valente Page 0,85

in.

Though, pretty soon, that’s going on the shelf, too—no alcohol, no sex, no nothing that might mute the muse.

“But seriously,” I add in a softer voice. Kirby had her place reinsulated last year, but it’s still an old cottage with thin walls, and I don’t want any of my bandmates knowing how far behind I am. “I’ve got to do something. We’re going into the studio in August to record, and I’ve got one song, dude. One. After a hundred hours in the writing cave.”

“Fuck,” she says, clearly feeling my pain. But she would. As a fellow career creative, she knows all about the strain of making art on demand.

“Yes. That. So I’m going to quit fucking before I’m any more fucked.”

“You seriously think it will help?” She shifts my way, passing over the flask. “I thought only meathead jocks believed their power seeped out of them with their seed. Remember when Coach Brewer made the wrestling team stop jerking off senior year, and they all kept getting hard-ons during the meets?”

“I do remember,” I say with a laugh-shudder. “It’s not like that for me. It’s just…” I shrug. “My best songwriting years were before we blew up, back when I was a kid right out of high school, writing songs and dreaming of a day when getting laid would be something that happened to me more than once or twice a year.”

It’s her turn to shudder. “Sounds torturous.”

“It was pretty miserable,” I agree, “but great for the creative muscles. Yes, I’ve written good songs since then, but never so quickly or with such consistent quality. You know?”

Kirby hums beneath her breath. “Okay. I can see your point. But what if it was a timing thing? I mean, maybe back then you were just full of that early fire. I used to write a lot faster, too. Five thousand-word days used to happen all the time. Now I get two thousand, and I treat myself to ice cream.”

I take a long swig of whiskey, chest burning as I swallow. “You could have a point. But I prefer to believe that I’ve been distracted and can course correct, not that I’m washed up at twenty-nine.”

“Aw, there, there.” Kirby’s hand lands on my shoulder for a series of awkward pats. “Don’t have a quarter-life crisis. It’s going to be okay.”

“You’re such a dude,” I say with a laugh.

“I’m not a dude.” She sniffs. “I’m just bad at offering meaningless words of comfort. I’m better at action. What can I do to help? You want to stay here and write for a while, now that the tour is over? The Garret room over at the bed and breakfast is empty until August, when it goes on the rental calendar again. It’s hot as balls up there on sunny days, but it’s quiet.”

“You’re really going to rent it out?” I say, surprised. “I thought you loved being the mad woman at work in the attic.”

“I did, but it’s time for a change of scenery.” She looks at the weathered boards above us. “I’m thinking of selling this place, too.”

“What? Why?” Kirby bought this cottage just off the square with her first big royalty check. It’s been a fixture in our lives since we were barely old enough to buy liquor to fill up our flask.

She’s silent for a moment before she adds in a voice almost too soft to hear, “Peter is all over the place here.”

I turn to her, squinting in the shadows, but it’s too dark to know if she’s wearing a “let’s talk” expression or her “mention feelings and I’ll cut you” face. But any mention of her ex is rare enough that I can’t let it slide. “So how’s that going? The getting-over-Peter project?”

“Shitty.” She reaches over, her cool fingers brushing mine as she takes the flask. “I mean, ending it was absolutely the right thing to do. If he hadn’t, I would have, but…I don’t know. He was my longest relationship, the guy who knew me best in the whole world. And then he decided I was too much of a pain in the ass to stay in love with and left. It just…sucks.”

“He was the pain in the ass. He was clearly threatened by your confidence and success. And that was his problem, not yours. You’re a kick-ass lady, and that’s a scientific fact.”

“I don’t think that was his problem. I think it was…other stuff,” she says vaguely. “But thank you.”

“No thanks needed. Facts are facts.”

She hums, a