Disharmony

Knight in Shining Armor

She paced.

If the current situation had taken place a year ago, by now she would be halfway through a bottle of Jack Daniels and on the prowl for a male to screw as a distraction.

But she was reformed. Or at least, she was attempting to be better, so instead of beginning the sprint down the path of self-destruction, she paced the length of her dressing room, shoving peanut M&Ms into her mouth as she did and wondering what the hell to do next.

Generally speaking, Kari had no idea what she was doing, but this was a whole new level of unknown territory. This was her father; a man she hadn’t spoken to in five years. A man she hadn’t ever expected to have to speak to again.

Ashamed of how their last interaction had gone down, he had disappeared after her first headline show without so much as a goodbye message. Maybe she could have put more effort into tracking him down, but the truth was that at first, she had thought the separation was for the best.

After all, it wasn’t as though she needed any more inspiration as she began her nights of alcohol and drug induced debauchery. Knowing Rocky Stevens, he would have completely supported her as she drank herself into oblivion and nearly destroyed her career. So it was probably better that he’d f****d off for half a decade because it gave her a chance to realize that the life he lived wasn’t the life she wanted for herself.

He had once had a promising career of his own as the lead singer of a rock band that was on its way to the top until his excessive partying and disregard for the feelings of his bandmates caused them to kick him out and sent him into an even more destructive downward spiral. Ever since his fall from grace, which culminated in him very publically denouncing the president of his record label at a release party, he’d never been able to find himself again.

Lord knows he tried. Finding himself was his excuse for never being around as Kari grew up. The first time he left, she had been four and told that he was going on a business trip. It wasn’t until he missed her fifth birthday six months later that she started to wonder if he was ever going to come back. He did, eventually, a few weeks after she turned five, only to leave again when she was seven and eight and ten, for what she deemed to be the final time. By the time she hit her teenage years, she had begun to think of him less as a parental figure and more of an acquaintance who just made an appearance in her life every so often.

Not that she really cared. Sure, maybe she would have liked the kind of father who would watch her practice her dance routines and push her on the swings at the park, but that’s not what she had and she accepted it, until his sudden arrivals and departures began to affect her plans to get out of the hellhole of a town she grew up in.

She’d gotten the record deal entirely on her own and although Kari’s mother didn’t approve of her daughter’s aspirations, she didn’t stop her either, so Kari dropped out of school to go on the road as the opening act for an up and coming boyband and a year later, she was finally standing backstage at her very first headline show. An event which her father had left his own mark on by drinking entirely too much and then upchucking the contents of his stomach onto her just minutes before she was supposed to go on stage.

From that day forward, Kari had decided that she wanted nothing to do with her father. It was one thing for her to enter her own downward spiral, but she refused to let someone else jeopardize her career.

He had been gone when she got off stage and she didn’t bother to figure out where he went and he didn’t contact her again. Until now, apparently.

Though, she supposed that it wasn’t her father reaching out in this case. This disaster was all Xavier’s fault.

As good as his intentions may have been, Xavier didn’t understand enough about her history with her father to know the kind of chaos which was about to reign or the severity of the situation he’d put her in.

So she paced and popped M&M’s into her mouth, hoping that she would work herself into a sugar coma and wake up to find this was all a bad dream.

A soft knock on her door stopped her on her way towards the back wall, and she called out for the person to enter, not bothering to look to see who it was until after they had shut the door behind them and turning on her heel to find Xavier standing by the door, looking very apologetic with his hands stuck into his pockets.

“What are you doing here?” she sighed, reaching down to the table in the center of the room to grab another handful of M&Ms from the plastic bowl and shoving about five into her mouth at the same time.

“I just wanted to apologize again,” he said quietly. “I know you’re pissed at me and when I did it, I guess I was thinking that if it were me, I’d love to spend one more day with my parents. But then afterwards, I realized there was probably a reason you haven’t talked to him in five years.”

She appreciated Xavier’s rosy view on family, she did, and a part of her even wished she could see it the same way, but she’d been let down by her parents far too many times for that to be the case.

“Look, I get it,” she replied once she’d swallowed all the M&Ms, brushing her hands together in hopes of removing the stickiness. “I do. You lost your parents when you were young, so of course you wish you could have spent more time with them. But you grew up in a family full of people who absolutely loved and adored you unconditionally and that just wasn’t the case for me. I stopped looking for my mom in the crowd of my talent shows or lying awake at night to hear if my dad was gonna come home a long time ago. I’ve realized that I don’t need them to love me. I don’t need anyone to love me. Because I love me and that’s more than enough.”

It had taken her a while, but she’d eventually come to terms with the fact that she was pretty good company, and she didn’t need anyone else to tell her that she was worth loving.

Xavier nodded, but his expression seemed a bit sad and she quickly concluded why it was that he was hurt by her statement. Because it hadn’t even been a month since he’d looked her directly in the eyes and told her with complete sincerity that he was falling in love with her and here she was, implying that she in no way felt the same about him.

But that wasn’t true.

Because Kari had been falling for Xavier ever since he’d caught her rummaging through his things in his dressing room all those months ago. Of course, she’d never say admit that to him. She was Kari Stevens. She wasn’t supposed to believe in love at first sight. She wasn’t supposed to believe in love at all.

She did, though. Ever since she was a child, she had dreamed about falling in love and finding someone who would be both the world’s best lover and the world’s best friend. And perhaps it made perfect sense that the person she’d dreamed about would turn out to be someone like Xavier Spiers, that the wild child would fall for the golden boy.

Still, at the moment, she had many more things to worry about than the fact that she might have hurt his feelings. Such as the impending arrival of the father who would only serve to add chaos to the dressing room.

Lifting his shoulders and inhaling deeply to indicate that this was a conversation that they could continue later, he spoke softly. “If I could go back in time and undo what I did, I would, but for now, is there anything I can do to help?”

The corners of her lips lifted into a smile and she crossed her arms over her chest and nodded. “Can you stay with me? I could use the moral support while he’s here.”

“Of course,” he replied immediately, taking a step forward and removing one hand from his pocket as though he was going to reach out towards her, but ultimately deciding against it. “Anything you need. I’m always here for you, Kar.”

“I know,” she stretched her lips into a smile.

There was still so much they didn’t know about each other and so much they needed to work through and understand, but Kari did know that she’d never felt as safe as she did when she was with Xavier, which was a huge step for someone who’d grown up in a house but never felt at home. She was certain this was only the first of many falling outs they’d have because, at the very least, she was certain she would f**k something up in the future, but she figured that what they had was worth fighting for; that Xavier was worth fighting for.

And maybe it wouldn’t end in happily ever after, but Kari had always been about enjoying the ride and not living with regrets, so she owed it to herself to check out the possibilities. Shaking her head as she plopped down on the couch and beckoned Xavier to join her, she couldn’t help but think that maybe growing up wasn’t so bad after all.