Page 53 of Never Been Shipped

And she punched Ryder square in his nose.

It made a sickening crunch, and then Ryder’s hands went up to his face, which was now pouring blood from both his nostrils. She was surprised by the amount of blood, and how quickly it came. She was also surprised by the sounds now coming out of his mouth, more animal than human.

She wasshockedby how much her hand hurt, and yet how good it had felt.

“What the fuck?” Ryder said, holding his hand over his nose. He’d stumbled after she punched him, and he’d let himself fall back into the sand, sitting awkwardly splayed out while he assessed the damage. “I’m going to sue you for assault, you bitch.”

“Try it,” John said, “and I’ll sue you for assaulting me first.”

Micah had a sudden, out-of-control urge to laugh.You should’ve seen the other guy, she thought. John didn’t look too bad, at least—he had a split lip, and touched it gingerly only to come away with blood on his fingers. But Ryder looked awful, and she couldn’t say she was too sorry to see it.

“I don’t thinkyouwant what could come out if I let it,” Rydersaid to her, and she flexed her hand, wondering if it was too soon to punch him again.

“I’m done feeling shame about any of that,” she said. “Butyoushould be ashamed. I wasted so much fucking time and energy on you, none of which you deserved. You wonder why you’re miserable? Because you’re miserable to be around. Our relationship was one long pit in my stomach. You think you’re god’s gift to music but you would be a hell of a lot better served just trying to be a halfway decent person.”

His eyes narrowed, and she could tell he was going to make another crack, something designed to humiliate her in front of everyone else. She didn’t particularly care about humiliating him, but she did care about shutting him up, and she knew one thing that would. She crouched down, her voice low so only he could hear it.

“I faked it every time,” she said. “But I’m done faking anything.”

Looking at Ryder now, she couldn’t believe she’d let him have such a hold over her for so long. Not just their relationship, but for the years afterward when she’d carried so much baggage from it. He was nothing.

She glanced back at John, who was standing tense and ready, like he was waiting to see if Ryder would try anything else. She had always been her truest self with John, and more than anything she regretted the way that the whole mess with Ryder and the band had warped that. She wished she could somehow go back in time, travel to when she was sixteen and do it all over again, but this time with different choices. But she couldn’t, and maybe it was time to make peace with that part.

She stood up, clenching her fist at her side, her knuckles still sore. She wanted to say something to the whole band—to Frankie, who was looking at her with concern; to Steve, who still looked a little shell-shocked; and most of all to John, who she’d hurt last night for no other reason than she was scared. But she didn’t know what to say, so instead she just gave them all a grim smile and walked away.

Chapter

Twenty-Three

When John foundMicah, she was sitting out on the beach, right on the line where the ocean met the shore. She had her arms linked around her knees, the bottom of her jeans darker where they’d gotten wet, her bare feet covered in sand. He lowered himself to sit next to her, and for a minute they just stared out at the ocean without talking.

“I brought you some water,” he said finally, placing a cup on the sand in front of them. He placed another cup right next to it. “And some extra ice.”

“Thank you.”

He hadn’t been surprised that Ryder attacked him. That had been a long time coming—he was almost relieved it had happened, was glad that the tension had finally erupted. Hehadbeen surprised when Micah punched Ryder back. He knew that had been an even longer time coming, that she obviously had more reasons to hate Ryder than any of the rest of them, but it had felt a little bit like she’d done it to stand up forhim, too. And he was surprised how good that had felt.

Still, he felt like there was a lot more to that story than she’d ever said, and suddenly that seemed like the key to all of it.

“When you asked me yesterday if Ryder had ever shown me anything,” he said, “what did you mean by that?”

She gave a jagged, humorless laugh, rubbing her eyes with her uninjured hand. “He has pictures of me,” she said. “Compromising pictures.”

That revelation in and of itself wasn’t that shocking. It was something people who dated did, John supposed. But the way Micah said it, he knew it was only the tip of the iceberg, and so he stayed silent, waiting for her to go on.

She glanced over at him, as if assessing his reaction to that before she continued. “When I broke up with him that last time, he threatened to release them,” she said. “He said it would be good for the band, actually. Get us some publicity. He said if I was going to use sex to sell our music then we may as well go all the way with it.”

John curled his fingers into his fists until he could feel his nails biting into his palms, and he had to make a deliberate effort to loosen his hand and stretch his fingers back out. He wished hehadpunched Ryder, after all. He wished he’d shoved his face into the sand so hard it would take days to get all the grit out of his eyes and mouth. The sudden violence of the fantasy was jarring to John, but for once he didn’t shy away from it. He let the scenario play out in his head, trying to control his breathing until eventually he was able to speak.

“That thing he said, about you being there for sex and novelty.” John turned to her, wanting to make sure she heard him, not just his words but reallyheardhim. “It’s not true. You never needed anything to sell our music. You have an incrediblevoice. A once-in-a-lifetime, sends-chills-down-my-spine voice. You’re so goddamn talented, Micah. As a singer and a songwriter. That’s what got us as far as we got—not any of the rest of it.”

She rubbed her hands over her legs, like she was cold, even though it was fairly warm in the sun. “It’s complicated, though, isn’t it?” she said. “Because I know that the way I look, the novelty of me being agirl…it is part of it. If I wear a shirt onstage where you can see my nipples, then that’s the big story afterward. But also I chose to wear that shirt, Iwantedto wear it, it made me feel powerful and sexy and like I could do anything. It’s part of the show, and I love to put on a show. But then I’d get off the stage, and I’d feel…I don’t know. Dirty. Pathetic, like I wasn’t good enough to stand on my own without the extra theatrics. Silly, like I was making a mockery of what we were doing, of themusic. But for me, it was all wrapped up together. I loved the music, I loved how it made mefeel, but no matter how I tried to express that, it felt like I was wrong somehow.”

John knew the exact show she was referencing. They’d played an outdoor festival, just after their second album—the weather had been suffocatingly humid, and they’d been scheduled in the middle of the day. Micah had worn a one-shouldered tank top, no bra underneath, and every article about the show afterward had included the same picture of Micah, her hair damp with sweat, leaning back, holding the microphone with both hands, the outline of both nipples clearly delineated against the thin fabric of her shirt.

It was an incredibly hot picture. He should know—he’d looked at it enough. But it was made all the better for itscontext, as far as he was concerned. He could hear Micah belting outthat note, could feel the energy of the crowd, could still channel the adrenaline that had coursed through him when they’d taken their final bows and run off the stage. He’d never thought Micah was wrong in any way she’d chosen to express herself with music. She’d always done it in a way that had lifted him up and put him right there with her.

“Here,” he said, pulling a wadded bunch of napkins out from where he’d stashed them in the pocket of his swim trunks. He grabbed a few ice cubes from the cup he’d brought and wrapped them up in the napkin, reaching for Micah’s hand. Her knuckles were a little red and swollen, and she winced slightly when he pressed the ice to the area, but he didn’t think anything was broken.

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