Evie Deal's life is turned upside down when her father's new band takes America by storm. She goes from being a shy girl living in poverty to riding with one of the craziest bands of the 80s, all while trying to manage a rocky relationship with the...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
When Evie got home, she found her father passed out drunk on the couch. She stood there for a few moments, feeling her throat close and her legs go weak. Evie always hated it when her dad got drunk, but she had learned to accept that it was bound to happen once a week or so. She couldn't (and wouldn't) accept it happening every other day.
He had only drank at this level in their darkest days. After her mom left. After the five failed band auditions. After the car accident and the medical bills. Not after joining a new band. Not after they were making enough to afford the groceries and the mortgage.
She had considered it before, and now she was certain that it had to be the guys in the band. The fucking kids who wanted to do nothing but drink, get high, and sleep around. They were taking away her kind, loving father, and turning him into a useless alcoholic.
She wanted to go down to the basement and scream at Nikki, tell him he needed to get his shit together, get out of their house, and stop trying to take away the one person in her life she could rely upon.
She restrained herself, though. She forced herself to go in the opposite direction, up to her room. The tears started coming halfway up the staircase, and they didn't stop for a good half an hour.
She didn't make dinner. She didn't eat, either. She stayed up in her room reading a book until she knew it time for her dad to leave to go to work.
He was stumbling around. When he was putting on his shoes, he might as well have been pulling his feet out of quicksand. It required the same amount of energy. When he saw Evie coming down the stairs, he looked at her with an ashamed look on his face. He wanted to apologize, but he couldn't think of a way to say it without it turning into a conversation that they did not have time for.
Evie broke their momentary eye contact, making Mick feel like a piece of shit. He didn't get off the couch until Evie had gone into the kitchen, seemingly for no reason, and then went back to her room.
Mick wouldn't see her again for the rest of the night.
Upstairs, the phone rang. It stopped. Then it rang again. Nikki wondered why no one was answering. On the fourth attempted call, he finally went up to the dark main level and answered it.
"Hello?"
"Nikki?" A sweet southern accent asked him.
"Yeah, Vince, what's up?"
"Tom and I are at your old place. We've got a beautiful redhead who'd like to meet you, if you're up to it."
Just like that, Nikki's spirits lifted. "I'll be over there in fifteen."
Nikki ran back to the basement, grabbed his coat, fixed his hair, and headed out the door.
He stopped, though, when he heard the startled gasp come from the wooden bench on the front porch. He turned to find Evie, her hands over her eyes to try to cover the fact that she was crying.
