Cassie shook her head. “I don’t know, Mom. Like, what’s weird is, I loved him. He loved us and I assumed that my whole life. I didn’t feel, like, UNLOVED, by him. But it just felt…shaky. I don’t know how to put it—I think I’m still working through it.”
“Dad was an asshole, that’s what it is,” Charlie said in an uncharacteristic outburst of anger. “He tapped out. Gave up. Stopped trying. With you, with all of us. Why, I can’t even begin to understand. But it’s an undeniable truth. And I’m getting the impression that of all of us, Lexie suffered from that the worst.”
“He was musically talented,” Liv said, musing half to herself. “Once upon a time, at least.”
Cassie stared. “He was? How? I never saw him with an instrument, never heard him sing a note unless it was in the car or the shower, and he wasn’t bad, but I wouldn’t have called his singing voice exceptional.”
Liv sighed. “He played the guitar, acoustic and electric. He was in a band. A pretty good one, too. Back when he was in high school. He actually took a gap year to try and make the band work—of course, back then nobody called it a gap year, we just called it not going to college. His dad gave him a year to make a go of being in a band instead of going to college. He was lead guitar and did backup vocals, and he was…really, really good. He could play almost anything—The Allman brothers, ZZ Top, Black Sabbath, even a decent cover of some Jimi Hendrix songs. The band did well, for a while. Started gaining notoriety in the local scene where we grew up in Connecticut, started booking gigs on the coast and even a few in New York. But they never quite got the break. They got close, got heard by some producers a few times, but never got the contract offer. And then the year came and went, and his dad forced his hand. Choose—pursue the band, but if you do, I won’t pay for college when you realize your band isn’t going anywhere and you don’t have a future.”
Charlie winced. “Ouch.”
“And let me guess,” Cassie said. “He chose college?”
Liv nodded. “Gave up music, went to college, got a job, made that his career, and that was it. I don’t think he ever looked back.” She was staring up, to the left—remembering. “He never talked about music. He enjoyed listening to it, but after he quit the band, he never even thought about it again, as far as I know. Not with me anyway.”
I rubbed the back of my neck. “I know this is your personal family business, but from an outsider’s perspective, it seems to me like he never really did get over it. Just shoved the dead dream down into the back of his head. For you, Cassie, your dream was dance, and when his own dream didn’t pan out he was skeptical anyone else’s could. Your dream being different from his meant it didn’t hurt him as much. For Lex, having a dream that had been his dream? It must have cut. He was jealous. Sorry to seem like I’m shittin’ on his memory, but…he cut Lexie to the bone when he said what he did—and I got no reason to think she was lyin’ or makin’ that up. I don’t think she recovered from it. And for the record, Alexandra is goddamn talented. I’ve only managed to tease a few little snippets out of her, and even that little bit blew me away. Just her and her little ukulele in the back of my bus––she was hesitant and quiet, but she…” I growled a sigh. “She’s got real talent. I’m sayin’ this as a professional, not as someone who has feelings for her.”
“And you think her dad killing her dream is what has her so upset?” Liv asked me. Her eyes were sharp.
I knew I owed her the truth. “I think that’s part of it, but not all.”
Liv tilted her head to one side. “What else would there be?”
“I honestly don’t know. She won’t talk about it.” I shrugged. “Not to me, not about the past, but I know there’s something. You don’t walk around with the kind of anger she’s got without somethin’ big lurking way down deep.”
Liv’s sigh, then, was pained. “And I have no idea what it could be—which means I missed something huge. Something beyond the fact that she had a dream and the talent to pursue it, and her father crushed it because of his own insecurities.”
“I wish I could offer more insight, but she keeps me at bay as much as she does everyone. And I confess I don’t know what to do.”
“I’ve seen her with you,” Charlie said. “She’s different with you. She’s let you in farther than anyone, including us. So, speaking for my family, I think, I would just say…please don’t give up on her. I think if anyone has a chance of getting her to open up and find some kind of healing from whatever it is that hurt her, it’s you.”
I felt my heart flip. Felt a heavy burden on my shoulders. “I’m tryin’. This is all new territory for me, and hell if I know what I’m doing. But I care about her and I’ll keep holdin’ the line with her until she won’t let me no more.”
It was something like two in the morning. I was buzzed, but only pleasantly so. I hadn’t seen Lex since earlier on the pier. The party had picked up as the evening went on—by some kind of unspoken agreement, the men all spent the early part of get-together doing the bulk of the kid-wrangling while the women congregated and drank and talked and laughed;
