Page 6 of Wicked Destiny

I can’t be a creepy old relic lusting after some young thing. I’ve been a rockstar, drug addict, man-whore to converted family man, father and now widower. Who I am to someone her age?

Nothing. Nada. Furniture. A subject for her paper.

Might as well try on the role like an old coat.

She flips open a folder with color-coded tabs down the edge. Catches me looking and taps the tabs. “I’m pre-law.”

“Good for you.” I lean back in my chair.

“So, rockstar. I did a little homework on you…” She bites her pen. “You handed me one name like a Bond villain. Imagine my surprise when I Google your ass to find out you’re a big deal around these parts.”

I brace for the turn. It always comes the second I quit being a person and go back to being a caricature. Her face never waivers, though. She spins the folder around and slides a printout across the table at me.

It’s me in 1994. I’m twenty-four years old with bleached hair down past my shoulders wearing a flannel knotted at my waist over a thrift-store thermal, glaring down a Belltown alley like it owed me money. The full grunge uniform.

Jesus. I look like a baby, though, even in this picture I’m probably older than she is now.

“Walk me through this. As my biography subject. In your own words, what were you thinking?” She taps the photo.

“Not much.” A laugh scrapes out of me, rough, like a hinge nobody has worked in years. “It was the nineties. Everybody in this city dressed like they lost a bet.”

“Hmmm. I think you dressed like the bet.” She winks.

There it is again, the casual, flirty thing. Nobody talks to me this way anymore but the moms in my neighborhood and fans when we’re on tour.

I haven’t entertained the thought of another woman since Yolanda came into my life. She had my number. Could take me apart at a dinner party and leave me grinning. Every person at the table fell in love with her for it. Since she died, everyone treats me like cracked china.

This young woman has known me two days and doesn’t interact with me like I’m gonna break. It takes every ounce of will power not to climb across the table and hug her.

Obviously, I resist the urge. Drink my coffee instead.

Elodie recites the actual assignment entirely out loud. All ten weeks. Probably a good thing since I didn’t even open the email.

We’re supposed to meet every other week. Not on campus, save for a mid-point check in with the group. For our interviews, we’re supposed to pick places with meaning and take the other one there so we can learn about each other organically.

Halvorsen wants the good, the bad, and the ugly. All three, or she fails us.

When Elodie is done reading, for half a second something crosses her face and gets folded away before I can identify it. “Cool. Love a syllabus with a body count.”

I’ve been around plenty of twenty-year-olds. I was one myself. Toured the world with four others. Have two of my own.

Enthusiasm aside, this young woman is wise beyond her years. An old soul in a young person’s body. She’s not immature, but doesn’t play at trying to seem older either. It’s almost like somewhere, beneath the surface, she carries something heavy and uses positivity to hide her sorrow.

Ah. I recognize it. She and I share a specific stillness of grief. It permeates your body when life teaches you no one is promised tomorrow.

I wonder who she lost.

It’ll be interesting to see if my instincts are correct.

Elodie wants to start by interviewing me since “I’m the one with a Wikipedia page and a history of catastrophic hair.”

She asks where we should meet. The honest answer is nowhere. I can’t think of a place we could go without Yolanda’s presence attached to it. The house. The practice space in Georgetown. Every fucking place in this town. Except—

“Let’s forget the home visits for now. We can meet here.” I turn my cup a slow half circle on the table.

She leans back and scrutinizes me for a moment. Doesn’t push. Instead, she nods, makes a note and allows me to be evasive. Maybe her Google search turned up the news about my wife’s death, it’s not a secret. It’s all over the internet.

“Of course. We ease in. Let’s meet back here in a few days.” Elodie stands and fights her way back into the wet denim jacket. Scribbles her number down. “As long as we have no boundaries, we’ll be good.”