Page 68 of Love is a Lyric
20
Ben
Piper: Are you okay?
Ben stared at those words, willing himself to respond. He’d spent the morning reading articles claiming the bandFatewas no more because lead singer, Ben Evans, had an affair with Quinn Hayes’ sister.
“Bro.” Chase sat on the arm of the couch and handed Ben a mug of coffee. “What did you do?” He stared down at his own phone, probably looking at the picture that had already circulated across the internet.
Once the Lyft arrived the night before, Ben escaped the paparazzi, but he couldn’t bring himself to go back to his parents’ house, to face the girl who’d run from him. So, he’d given the driver Chase’s address instead and waited outside the door until Chase got home.
“I don’t know.” Ben sipped his coffee but only to have something to do. What had he done? Had he ruined everything? His career, his life…
His friendship with Piper.
Chase let out an angry huff, and Ben couldn’t look at him. He deserved every bit of ire his brother held for him, every long silence and scathing look.
He waved his phone in front of Ben’s face. “What did you do?” he said again as if repeating the question would drag a different answer out of his brother.
Ben set the mug on the coffee table and bent forward, his elbows resting on his thighs.
Chase jumped up and paced across the room. Back and forth, his fists clenching at his sides. After what seemed like an eternity of waiting for the storm Ben knew was coming, Chase stopped in front of him, only the table separating them.
Ben looked up at him, his chest deflating. “I’m sorry, okay? I know I need to just focus on the music.”
“You think I care about the music?” His scowl deepened. “You don’t get it, do you? We aren’t in L.A. where people actually care that you’re famous. Here in Ohio, here with us, you’re only Benji. And it was Benji who screwed up, not Ben Evans.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Do you think it was Ben Evans she kissed last night?”
Piper. He closed his eyes, picturing her standing in the rain as if it didn’t bother her, running through the streets to save him from the paparazzi. He could still feel her lips on his.
Chase sighed. “It was you, Benji. She kissed you. Not because you’re famous or you can carry a tune. She’s in love with you.”
Ben froze, his heart pulsing against his ribs as if trying to break free. “No.”
He both wanted it to be true and didn’t. If Piper… There’d only been one woman he’d loved and that ended. But had he loved her? Kissing Quinn never stole the breath from his lungs, it never sent him spinning into the darkness wondering which way was up.
Not the way Piper… “How do you know that?”
The anger faded from Chase as he rounded the table to sit next to Ben on the couch. “I know Piper almost as well as I know myself. Her expressions, her movements. She’s a part of me, always has been. There’s this look she gets when her eyes meet yours. I don’t know if she knows she's doing it. But it’s hard to mistake the emotions on her face.”
Ben shook his head. Piper never let her emotions show, it was one of the things he respected about her at the same time it frustrated him. He never knew what she was thinking.
As if reading his mind, Chase continued. “You have to look deeper, Ben. Piper thinks she has to be strong for everyone. That she has to let Quinn treat her like crap because her sister needs her. That she has to think about what everyone needs before they think about it themselves. And you… she’ll never let you get close.”
“Why not?”
“Because it would alter this tightly controlled world she’s created. A world where you and Quinn are the rockstars and she’s the girl the shadows own, the one not worthy of a spotlight.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Yes, but it’s Piper. I warned her about you, Ben.”
That should have hurt. His own brother didn’t trust him. But he understood because he didn’t trust himself.
“You’re my brother, Ben, and I love you, but Piper is my everything. She’s been there for me my entire life. I don’t want to see her get hurt.”
