Read Online Strings by Kendall Grey - Free Book Online Page B

and
frankly, I don’t want to face the truth.
    I’m fucking devastated.
Another gigantic stop sign in the endless, pointless cycle of my
career. People wonder why musicians and artists turn to drugs and
alcohol. Why they blow their fucking heads off or drown in their
own puke. This is
why. If bad reviews, snubs from record companies, and lukewarm
receptions from fans don’t kill you, mutiny will.
    I put so many years into this band, and one
deadly blowup from Kate vaporized everything I worked for. I feel
like I’ve lost a limb.
    After spending the week curled in the fetal
position, drowning in a well of self-pity, I sprout a pair of
pea-sized womanballs and steal a day-old newspaper from work. I
figure it’s time to get serious about my life since the music
segment of this comedy show has been cut due to lack of funding.
Plus, the lease agreement on my shitty apartment in Crack Alley
ends in a couple months. It would be great to make enough money to
upgrade to Dream-On Heights where the roaches are smaller and the
junkies only come out at night instead of sitting on other people’s
stoops all day long.
    Morning coffee in hand and tattered slippers
on my feet, I plop down on my moth-eaten sofa and turn eagerly to
the classifieds section. Let’s see…credit union assistant manager.
Truck driver. Hospital pharmacist. Communications technician.
Accounting supervisor.
    I shuffle the pages. Where
are the jobs for uneducated lowlifes? Athens is a fucking college
town. Surely, there’s something available for high school grads. There has to
be.
    I scan farther down the page. More of the
same. On and on it goes. There aren’t even any decent waitressing
jobs for higher-end restaurants.
    I toss the paper aside. I am so fucked.
    My cell flops weakly across the table like a
fish out of water. The thing produces more of a sporadic cough than
a vibration, and I can’t afford another one. Hell, my mom took over
monthly payments on this one until New Year’s. It was her Christmas
present to me last year. No idea what I’ll do when January 1 rolls
around. The way things are going, I’ll have to either live without
a blasted phone or not eat.
    I snatch up the infernal device. “Hello?” I
growl into the speaker.
    “ Hey, Letty. It’s Jinx.”
She’s quieter than usual.
    My anger quells, and I sigh. “Hey, girl.
How’s it going?”
    “ It kinda
sucks.”
    “ Yeah. Same
here.”
    “ You talk to Kate or
Jillian?”
    “ Nope.”
    “ Me neither.”
    “ Why’d you call, Jinx? I
gotta leave for work pretty soon.”
    “ I—I don’t really know
why. I guess I just missed you.” Her voice trembles.
    My vision blurs unexpectedly, and I choke
up. I plug my nose between finger and thumb to stop the sudden
tingling there. Doesn’t work. Stupid tear ducts decide to go into
unauthorized mass production. The bastards. “I miss you too.”
    “ Is it really over? I
mean, are we…broken up?”
    I wipe the drops away with my sleeve. “I
don’t know what we are, but I think it’s safe to assume we’re
broken up until we hear otherwise.”
    “ Okay.” Jinx says the word
so softly, I almost don’t hear it. A long pause follows. “I guess
I’ll talk to you later. Bye.” The line dies.
    I pull the phone back at stare at it for a
solid minute.
    Who really got screwed in all of this band
drama? Jinx. I’ve known her forever, and I understand how her mind
works. She holds shit in and takes it out on her drums. Now she
can’t even do that because the goddamn drums are what brought her
down in the first place. She must be devastated. An innocent kicked
to the curb by her insensitive pimp Jillian.
    Fuck Jillian. Fuck Kate. And fuck that
asshole Shades for making me doubt myself.
    Now I’m pissed. I guess it’s better to be
pissed than a quivering blob of delicate emotion in desperate need
of a maxi pad.
    I stomp to my tiny
bedroom, dig through the dirty clothes pile for a work uniform.
Naturally, I haven’t been to the